Rushing through the Center for Health Sciences with his head down and a sad look on his face, MindFul Music’s student target suddenly removes his earbuds, shocked at the sight of a jazz quartet performing right there in Café Med.
Promoting wellness on campus through music inspired UCLA alumna Dalida Arakelian to launch MindFul Music, a student-directed organization that bridges student musical talent into the highly academic environment of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
MindFul Music spreads live music to areas of campus where it normally would not be found, such as Café Med, with the aim to improve peoples’ moods, especially reducing anxiety and stress said third-year music student Virginia Pettis.
Arakelian said MindFul Music is committed to recruiting new musicians and showing students that classical and jazz music may be performed therapeutically.
“We are sticking to a fine form of music because that is what has essentially been forgotten or pushed aside with pop culture,” Arakelian said. “We are promoting this beautiful form of music that everyone can enjoy in a contemporary public setting.”
Once a week, at Café Med or the outside courtyard, MindFul Music hosts half-hour performances that Arakelian said have been a pleasant surprise thus far for students.
A performance is set every Wednesday of fall quarter, ending with a holiday finale concert. Last week, The Matt Gafney Ensemble, a student jazz quartet, performed for MindFul Music’s first event at Café Med.
“Instead of being a one-on-one kind of music therapy, MindFul Music is a public health intervention that surrounds a bunch of people with a shared music experience, so it’s a community thing more than individual,” Pettis said.
After receiving a grant from UCLA’s Healthy Campus Initiative, a campus-wide wellness movement, MindFul Music was founded as a public health and research project, Arakelian said.
A medical student and classically trained pianist, Sean Dreyer heads MindFul Music’s three-person research and evaluation team.
“There are many studies out that have shown how music can be used as a huge stress relief,” Dreyer said. “During surgery, researchers have found that Mozart’s music, for example, calms people down and puts them in a deeper sleep.”
Arakelian said MindFul Music’s work with the Healthy Campus Initiative provides the accountability and mentorship to eventually launch the program at other UCs.
“We have designed a survey of four validated questions from a published scientific journal article,” Arakelian said. “We are aiming to get these results published so we can springboard off of our results and be viral at other institutions.”
The Center for Health Sciences was chosen as the launch location as Arakelian said it is a common area where medical school students congregate and take their break between classes.
“During lunchtime, are medical students expecting to have a string quartet or a jazz ensemble?” Arakelian said. “That is when the earbud comes out, and peoples’ mindsets (are) shifted.”
The feeling of being overwhelmed in a crowded lecture hall is a feeling Arakelian said she remembers since her time as a UCLA undergraduate and has sought to alleviate through music.
“Music is that nonintrusive, organic way for people to just pull their earbuds out and look to the person next to them, not knowing who they are and maybe strike up a conversation or nod heads, feeling like, ‘OK, I am connected here,’” Arakelian said.
Dreyer said lunchtime should be more of a stress-relieving break for people busy with graduate schoolwork, a goal MindFul Music seeks to accomplish.
“After you leave that midterm or that class, around the corner you are going to be hearing music,” Arakelian said. “It gives you that 30 seconds of, ‘OK, there’s more to life than what I’m doing here in this class.’”