Welcome to the official podcast of the Grammy-nominated record label Metta Mindfulness Music,
Where we discuss how the ancient wisdom and neuroscience of our sound healing music can improve your health,
Well-being,
And transform your life into an inspired,
Positive experience.
I'm your host,
Pete Serdan,
And for our first episode,
We'll be introducing you to our founders,
Yuval Ron and Dr.
Richard Gold,
How they met and decided to form our one-of-a-kind record label with the goal of creating beautiful,
Original music to enhance health,
Mental equanimity,
And the daily expression of loving-kindness.
Our creative director,
Yuval Ron,
Is an award-winning composer and sound healing artist who has been involved in the world of music therapy since a commission in 1990 from researcher Robert Monroe of the Monroe Institute to compose hemi-sync music using binaural beats.
Since then,
He has collaborated with neuroscientists Mark Waldman and Dr.
Andrew Newberg,
As well as psychotherapist Dr.
Sanjay Manchada.
Yuval has been invited to speak on the topic at numerous prestigious universities,
Such as Yale,
Johns Hopkins,
UCLA,
And MIT.
Our executive producer and president,
Dr.
Richard Gold,
Is a licensed acupuncturist and holds a doctorate in psychology.
He graduated from Oberlin College in 1972 with a degree in world religions and a minor in pre-medicine,
Followed by graduating from the New England School of Acupuncture in 1978.
Since then,
He has devoted his professional career to the study,
Practice,
Research,
And teaching of East Asian medicine.
In recent years,
Dr.
Gold has studied neuroscience and the evolving understanding of the effects of sound and meditation on the brain.
Bringing together both of their unique and impressive experience,
Yuval and Dr.
Gold formed the record label Metta Mindfulness Music,
The topic of this podcast,
To create beautiful,
Sound-healing music informed by ancient wisdom traditions and the most current research in neuroscience for health,
Happiness,
Mindfulness,
And creativity.
Metta,
That's with two Ts,
Is an ancient Sanskrit word meaning loving-kindness,
One of the four divine states of mind in Buddhist philosophy.
Loving-kindness is commonly defined as a pure,
Unselfish,
And universal love towards all living things.
Since our formation,
Our wellness music tracks have been used to promote well-being at numerous clinics,
Workshops,
Yoga studios,
Hospital waiting rooms,
And meditation and wellness apps.
Now,
We are going to listen to an excerpt from an interview with Dr.
Richard Gold on his personal journey to meeting his creative partner,
Yuval Ron,
How he developed an interest in using neuroscience and ancient wisdom to expand on human consciousness,
Improve the health of humanity,
And spread Metta throughout the world.
From the start of my clinical practice in Chinese medicine,
I've used music in the treatment room to help create the environment for healing.
I remember in the old days,
We would have boomboxes on the floors playing CDs in the cassettes.
So music was always part of what I was doing,
And I've taught for many years.
And I would often use music,
Different styles of music in my courses too.
Coincidentally,
I used to use Deva Premal quite a bit when I was teaching traditional Thai medical massage,
Which grew out of the monasteries,
The Buddhist monasteries in Thailand,
The Theravada Buddhist monasteries.
So it's really been part of who I am as a doctor and who I am as a healer.
And coincidentally,
In part of my history,
When I went to Oberlin College in Ohio,
Oberlin has one of the country's top music schools,
Conservatory of Music also,
Par with Berklee School of Music.
So there was one building in Oberlin that had 300 Steinway pianos in it.
So music's really just been part of my being,
Although I'm not personally musical as a playing,
But I love it and it's part of my nourishment in life.
And so again,
I mentioned earlier,
I had no ambition to be a music producer.
It never even crossed my mind.
It never came up in a dream.
And in 2011,
I was teaching traditional Thai massage at Esalen Institute in Big Sur,
And I was playing Deva quite a bit during that course.
And Yuval happened to be teaching there at the same time,
Of course,
With a renowned neuroscientist on sound in the mind,
Sound in the brain.
And we just met.
Now,
I had taught at Esalen for 15 straight years,
And only one of those years I met Yuval Rahn.
And I had been using,
Besides music in my healing work,
I had begun to use a number of years before I met Yuval,
Binaural sounds to help deepen my meditation experience.
Some had run into a wall,
And I didn't have a guru,
And I felt I needed,
And music,
The sounds of binaural,
Which is a whole other subject,
I was using.
So I was already into the idea of music to facilitate changes in the brain,
And I'd begun to study brain function.
So when I met Yuval,
Before I had a conscious thought,
I presented the idea of is there a way to use music and neuroscience,
But binaural sounds are just sounds.
They're not musical.
Is there a way to have something be musically interesting,
In fact,
Not interesting,
But profoundly interesting,
And also use that music to facilitate healing and mindfulness?
And Yuval's eyes lit up,
And it turns out in his history,
Early in his career he had worked with the Monroe Institute to create some of the earliest brainwave types of music also.
So this was just a blessed accident.
I was at a place in my life where I had the time and the resources to become a patron of the arts,
And I couldn't have asked for a better creative partner than Yuval.
He's become a dear friend and a collaborator and a true blessing,
Not just in my personal life,
But our music has been able to reach worldwide now through the Internet,
Which even though the music industry is in chaos because of streaming,
In a way,
Because no one buys music anymore,
Per se,
Or subscriptions,
Our reach of our music is much broader than we ever could have imagined.
And really what started just as a one-off,
We thought we would do the Chinese Six Healing Sound,
Because that's the tradition.
I've been in Chinese medicine for over 40 years now,
And there's a very rich tradition of sound in Chinese medicine.
But we enjoyed working so much,
And there was such a positive response that we've kept this up.
And just for future,
We're still in the workshop.
We're still creating,
And we have some wonderful projects that are already cooking on the stove,
Or the creative stove.
