Happiness Break: Making Music With Your Body, With Keith Terry

The Science of Happiness

PRX and Greater Good Science Center

Science, Social Sciences

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 10 August 2023

⏱️ 8 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Relieve stress, boost self-esteem, and increase focus through a simple body music practice. And do it with a friend to feel more compassion and a hit of oxytocin.

Link to episode transcript: https://tinyurl.com/yc8aer74

How to Do This Practice:

Try using these movements to create various rhythmic combinations with your body:

One: Clap your hands, slightly cupping with each clapping instead of hitting your full palms together.

Two: Tap your right hand to your left chest.

Three: Tap your left hand to tap your right chest.

Four: Tap your right thigh with your right hand.

Five: Tap your left thigh with your left hand. Then loop back to the top.

Today’s Happiness Break host:

Keith Terry is a percussionist and body musician who uses a variety of surfaces to create interesting rhythms.

Learn more about Keith Terry: https://tinyurl.com/5av66v5f

Watch Keith Terry in action: https://tinyurl.com/299vuw4a

More resources from The Greater Good Science Center:

The Science of Synchronized Movement (The Science of Happiness Podcast): https://tinyurl.com/mrys53k4

Five Ways Music Can Make You Healthier: https://tinyurl.com/4ckbtc2e

How Music Helps Us Be More Creative: https://tinyurl.com/4mj6vs44

Wired for Music: https://tinyurl.com/ye2xkjxz

Four Ways Music Strengthens Social Bonds: https://tinyurl.com/y257y25p

How was your experience creating body music? Email us at [email protected] or use the hashtag #happinesspod.

Find us on Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/2cyp46rp

Help us share Happiness Break! Rate us and copy and share this link: https://tinyurl.com/2cyp46rp

We’re living through a mental health crisis. Between the stress, anxiety, depression, loneliness, burnout — we all could use a break to feel better. That’s where Happiness Break comes in. In each biweekly podcast episode, instructors guide you through research-backed practices and meditations that you can do in real-time. These relaxing and uplifting practices have been shown in a lab to help you cultivate calm, compassion, connection, mindfulness, and more — what the latest science says will directly support your well-being. All in less than ten minutes. A little break in your day.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I'm Dacker Keltner, welcome to Happiness Break, where we take a short break in the day
0:06.9	to try a practice shown to help us find a sense of calm and connection with ourselves and
0:12.0	each other.
0:13.0	Today, we're going to do something kind of different.
0:15.5	We're going to create rhythms using nothing but our bodies in a kind of musical meditation.
0:21.3	Body percussion practices have been shown to help reduce stress and anxiety, boost self-esteem
0:26.6	and help us focus.
0:28.6	And when we move our bodies in sync with other people, this helps us feel more compassion,
0:33.0	behave more altruistically, thanks to higher levels of oxytocin.
0:37.6	Leading us today is Keith Terry, a world-renowned composer and percussionist who uses his own
0:43.2	body as his instrument.
0:44.7	We're going to follow along as Keith guides us through a practice he created called
0:50.4	body music, starting with just some basic claps and moving right along into some rhythms
0:56.2	using the chest.
0:58.4	So find somewhere where you feel comfortable, where you can move around a little, and where
1:02.4	it's okay for you to get into your body and make some noise.
1:06.9	Here's Keith.
1:07.9	Hi, I'm Keith Terry, I'm a musician, I'm a rhythm dancer and an educator.
1:17.5	And in the 1970s, as a result of working with a lot of tap dancers, I had the thought that
1:23.0	I could stand up and I could play all the rhythms I was playing on my drums on my body.
1:29.4	They were really inspiring to me, and I became a body musician.
1:36.0	Body music is fun and useful in artistic ways and music and dance, choreography, but it also
	...

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