By Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim

January 4, 2019

This article discusses the practice of music meditation, specifically focusing on a meditation held at Princeton University. The purpose of music meditation is not to enjoy a musical performance. Rather, it is to focus on one’s breathing and to temporarily be free from all of life’s distractions, as is the case in more traditional meditative practices. The difference is that in musical meditations, there are musicians present who take part in leading the meditation. Because the purpose for going to a music meditation is not to listen to music, one might think that this would result in a feeling of diminished pressure on the musicians. The musicians who played at the Princeton meditation, however, supposedly felt keenly aware of the audience’s heightened focus on their playing as a result of the meditative environment. Matthew Weiner, a dean at Princeton who helped to organize the music meditation on campus, described this heightened focus by the meditation-goers as sensitivity, rather than silence. Their intent was not simply to be quiet, but to become fully immersed in the experience, which included the live music being played by the present performers.