Music for Self-Care & General Wellness

Music for Self-Care & General Wellness

We here at IUPUI are passionate advocates of creative engagement and expression as healing practices. Research supports the use of music in particular for everything from improving respiration rates to relaxation for pain and stress management. Our program has always been committed to supporting our community through best practices in music therapy, now more than ever. With this one-page resource dedicated to self-care, we hope to provide you with a few avenues for exploring your personal music use and preferences as a means of creating culturally relevant and sustainable means for stress management in your own life.

 

Resources

Music Listening Self – Assessment: click HERE for a worksheet to help you map out your personal music preferences for listening. You can use this worksheet as a source to consult in the future when you’re encountering a feeling that music listening may support you in processing.

Identity/Values Musical Collage: click HERE for a series of prompts on building a playlist that you can refer to whenever you’re feeling the need to validate yourself in the strength of who you are and what you value.

Music Assisted Relaxation: we have TWO options here, a shorter Harp Relaxation available HERE, that walks you through some general breathing exercises and physical release, then a longer Affirmations-based Relaxation available HERE.

Ambient Playlists (pre-selected music for relaxation, curated by members of the IUPUI Music Therapy Program): click HERE to access a pre-set playlist of ambient music on Apple Music OR click HERE for a collection of ambient music by Brian Eno on Spotify.

Our friends at Riley Children’s Hospital have a YouTube channel you can visit HERE.

For more information on the IUPUI Music Therapy Program, please click HERE.

FIX with the Indiana State Museum

Interested in some more social music collaboration?

Description of the video:

00:08
hello my name is Natasha Thomas and with
00:12
me are my students from the IUPUI Music
00:16
Therapy program hello I know I know and
00:19
we're here to talk about open again a
00:22
collaborative songwriting experience
00:25
created by the music therapy program at
00:27
IUPUI the song was written by myself and
00:31
dr. Megan Masco it in collaboration with
00:33
the Indiana State Museum for their fix
00:36
exhibit and you are invited to help us
00:39
in contributing to this original piece
00:42
of music the piece is composed with the
00:45
prompt atmospheric so if you're familiar
00:47
with Bjork or Ebay those artists are
00:51
sort of in the vein of what this piece
00:53
was created to be there are three
00:56
different versions of the song that
00:58
exist in an online Google Drive you to
01:00
listen to and or download there are
01:03
multiple ways to contribute to this
01:05
project but one of which is to just
01:07
submit your own updated lyrics or audio
01:11
into the Google Drive the other is to
01:15
join us in a virtual studio in soundtrap
01:18
if you choose to contribute to the piece
01:20
by using sound chat here's the link
01:23
you're gonna want to do it with and this
01:25
link will be in the Google Drive this
01:28
admits you to a group in soundtrap and
01:33
once I've seen that you've joined the
01:35
group then I will admit you to the piece
01:37
so joining the group doesn't
01:39
automatically put you in in the studio
01:42
with the song I have to see that you're
01:44
in the group and then I'll manually add
01:46
maybe into the studio to contribute to
01:50
the piece clicking the link in Google
01:55
Drive should take you directly to this
01:57
screen even on a mobile device you can
02:00
actually download soundtrap as an app
02:02
from the Apple App Store or in Google
02:05
Play but just in case that link doesn't
02:08
work for you we're going to show you one
02:10
other way that you can also join the
02:11
group in soundtrap along with some bass
02:13
tips and tricks for adding loops or
02:15
contributing your own original audio
02:17
profile I'm gonna go to my groups and
02:21
then join group once you have the the
02:26
group code we'll see XP vwf a alright
02:34
once you have a screen code or that
02:37
group code you're gonna enter it and
02:39
join the group look at that there you go
02:45
that's how you sound trap perfect
02:48
alright so once you've been added to the
02:51
group you can go back to your profile
02:53
page and you'll have the open again
02:57
project available for you to edit and
03:00
from here you'll just click on studio
03:02
and that'll take you into the studio
03:05
where you can view and edit the project
03:13
perfect beautiful yes you've got your
03:16
little like introductory information
03:18
over there on the right and that chat
03:19
window is a way for you to communicate
03:21
with us if you're having any issues with
03:23
the piece or anything like that that
03:25
automatically syncs to everyone who's
03:27
been working on the project
03:32
walk us through what we're looking at
03:34
here all right so when you entered the
03:37
soundtrap interface there's a few basic
03:40
things you need to know to be able to
03:43
use it best over here are gonna be all
03:45
of your tracks and then this that's just
03:49
gonna have each individual sound laid
03:51
out you know nice and neat for for you
03:56
and then if you go to the bottom you can
03:59
add a new track and add new beats loops
04:03
etc you can invite someone to
04:05
collaborate on this this track with you
04:10
you can import your own sounds if you
04:13
have your own sounds available to you
04:15
and then down here at the bottom you're
04:18
gonna have a little toolbar that has the
04:22
how many beats per minute you're getting
04:24
in the song the key that the song is in
04:28
and then play fast-forward stop and
04:31
record and then your volume button super
04:38
simple so if you want to add an
04:40
additional audio track if you'd like to
04:42
record something for the project what
04:43
you'll do is you'll hit the add new
04:45
track icon down here there's a lot of
04:48
options if you want to set up loops but
04:49
we're going to choose voice and
04:51
microphones when you choose voice and
04:54
microphones you can click this icon and
04:56
you can add any sort of effects that
04:59
you'd like to on your voice we're just
05:01
going to use the computer mic enhancer
05:02
and then when you are ready to record
05:06
also you can choose your your microphone
05:09
down here but if you're on mobile just
05:12
default to your to your mobile
05:16
microphone and then so if you'd like to
05:19
start recording whatever whatever
05:22
contribution you'd like you'll hit start
05:23
recording we recommend that you use
05:26
headphones so that it mitigates so that
05:29
there's less feedback when you're
05:31
recording you'll click using headphones
05:33
and then the first time you connect to a
05:36
microphone you should be prompted with a
05:38
screen that will test your audio to make
05:40
sure your volume levels aren't so high
05:41
that they'll clip or overload your mic
05:43
you should try to make the loudest sound
05:45
you and
05:45
to make when you see this screen for the
05:47
best results so then also if you intend
05:51
to record you'll want to make sure that
05:53
the track that you are recording on is
05:54
armed so you'll do this by hitting the R
05:58
by the track and that will arm it and
06:00
prepare it for recording yeah so that's
06:04
how you can input like manual audio your
06:06
voice a guitar with a microphone any
06:09
other instrument that you just had lying
06:12
around your house know that you might
06:13
want to contribute west but you can also
06:16
contribute electronic loops from a loop
06:20
library in soundtrack you can click on
06:26
this little purple loop button it shows
06:29
you all of these options for pre-made
06:32
loops so I'm in the drums area right now
06:34
but you can also head over to piano and
06:37
you'll notice when you cycle through
06:39
these because we set the key of the
06:40
piece of C minor every one of these
06:42
melodic options is going to be in C
06:45
minor so in the key of the song
06:53
let's put that in okay so you'll
06:56
literally click and drag it well god
06:59
haha I didn't even have to drag it
07:01
actually I double clicked by accident
07:02
and it just dropped in so this is how
07:04
easy that could be right yeah so then I
07:07
go back and I hit play and it's already
07:13
there
07:14
it's a little loud bow so I turn my
07:17
footing down on it that's it it was
07:22
literally that simple I'm just selecting
07:24
an instrument double-clicking it or
07:27
clicking once to audition it to hear it
07:29
see if I like it
07:30
then double clicking or click and drag
07:32
to put it into the piece itself play
07:36
back see how you like it and then mess
07:38
with the volume if you want to we didn't
07:43
really talk about these little buttons
07:44
if you hit that little headphone icon it
07:47
mutes everything else so that you can
07:49
only hear this by contrast if you click
07:51
the little speaker button with the X it
07:53
means this track so you can hear
07:55
everything else but not this one and
07:56
then this button depending on the
07:58
version of soundtrap that you're working
08:00
with because I did find this out the
08:01
free version may not allow you to do any
08:04
automation stuff but if you're somebody
08:07
operating with a trial version or a
08:10
premium version or the academic suite
08:14
that I currently have a trial of when
08:16
you click on an ad fancy extra controls
08:20
like volume being able to fade things up
08:22
and down in the middle of the track or
08:24
panning between speakers and then sweeps
08:28
so you can get fancier if you want to
08:30
but generally these are the most
08:34
straightforward ways to add so
08:43
so we're gonna to make a loop first I
08:46
gotta go down here to add a new track
08:49
and then you can choose between
08:52
basically any of these except the voice
08:55
and microphones and so I guess we can
09:00
start with piano and keyboard so then
09:05
you click on that and right here is the
09:08
different sounds you can use for your
09:11
loop like if you want to preview some of
09:14
them like this one gives you a little
09:19
preview of each one to use and then you
09:23
can also switch the instrument like the
09:26
instruments it showed when you added the
09:28
new track so you can like oh well
09:31
instead I want to go to the synth or the
09:33
string sort of brass and woodwinds but
09:37
yeah okay we'll go back to Cuba and they
09:42
have some pretty interesting names -
09:46
[Music]
09:49
sounds the name is too good not to use
09:52
it you know so you can actually use the
09:58
letters on your on your keyboard and
10:00
numbers the different so you want to
10:17
click on here to like create this area
10:22
to make the loop on um and then so then
10:26
you can record it which is already armed
10:28
on the side here whenever queer button
10:30
and then so you can either just place
10:34
the notes on here like you just
10:37
double-click on there and then it'll
10:39
place it down oh yeah and you can extend
10:44
it to two however long you need you just
10:47
to like you hold down on it and then it
10:49
gives you a little
10:50
no later extend it as long as you want
10:54
you can hit this button and when you're
10:57
ready to record something you can start
11:00
or use the keyboard to record it - then
11:05
it'll create that loop for you I guess
11:07
for this time do the piano roll to show
11:13
you guys this is just like it's the same
11:16
keyboard they just tipped it sideways so
11:18
you're just seeing things spread out
11:20
that way and what's nice about this is
11:23
you can mess with the timing of it
11:25
without having to play it over and over
11:26
again if you want since we know the
11:29
piece is in C minor like the key of the
11:31
piece is already set so you can just
11:33
create like you're on C for right now
11:35
you can just create a single C and we
11:38
can just hear it in the context of the
11:39
piece and call me did ya do that just
11:54
[Music]
12:01
there we go yeah let's hear how it
12:03
sounds obviously you can do and you can
12:23
play with the volume like making it
12:25
softer and then if you like click on the
12:27
little if you hover over where it gave
12:29
you the little like curly curly play
12:32
sign again you can extend the loop as
12:34
well oh yeah I could yeah yeah so if you
12:37
want to keep your loop going throughout
12:40
this song you can just move it over and
12:45
it'll automatically duplicate it for you
12:49
yeah you see the little indention there
12:53
you'll know that it's gone through the
12:55
entire loop right I'm starting over
12:59
yeah there you go sway so we went over
13:04
creating an account in soundtrap who
13:06
went over entering the studio setting up
13:08
your studio and audio for recording and
13:11
then two different ways to create moods
13:14
yes Joe saving changes thank you yes
13:22
so after you make changes like I just
13:26
made a change right by putting this
13:28
piece in go up to the little purple
13:29
button and again it only turns purple if
13:31
you have something to save if you
13:33
haven't really made any significant
13:34
changes that button or may be available
13:36
to you but if it is save it and then
13:40
your collaborators will get a
13:41
notification over here that you've made
13:44
updates and then they will need to hit
13:47
the sync button and once they do that
13:51
then everybody's on the same page
13:52
looking at the most recent changes to
13:54
the project yeah cool thank you for that
13:59
reminder to talk about that I think the
14:01
last piece that I had written down to
14:03
talk about was troubleshooting if there
14:05
are issues with the piece you can post
14:07
comments inside this chat and everybody
14:10
who's collaborating on the project will
14:11
see them and that's probably the best
14:14
way because then you have multiple
14:16
opportunities for people to see it and
14:18
give you feedback because I may not
14:20
always be nearby email but that's
14:24
another way if you're experiencing
14:25
difficulties contributing to the track
14:27
my email is Matt one that's n80
14:30
and the number one and I you edu and you
14:34
can also contact me directly if you're
14:35
like I want to contribute to this but
14:37
it's not working so that's another way
14:40
to troubleshoot the project but other
14:42
than that I think that's everything you
14:44
need to know to contribute to the open
14:47
again original songwriting experi
14:50
in collaboration between IUPUI visa
14:52
parity and DML statements exhibit for
14:57
joining us
15:00
[Music]
15:01
[Laughter]
15:12
[Music]

FIX Description

Join members of IUPUI's Music Therapy program in Soundtrap, a cloud/drive digital audio workstation, as they put together a community collaborative piece called “Open (again)” in conjunction with the Indiana State Museum’s FIX Exhibit. This video explains some background information on the exhibit and how to participate in our interactive portion on Soundtrap. We give brief overviews of the user interface and basic audio terminology to make the project accessible and encourage anyone to participate, including consideration for accessing the platform on different devices (mobile, desktop, tablet, etc).