Dana Swarbrick

• Olivier Lartillot, Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham & Carlos Eduardo Cancino-Chacón (2025). Video Visualization of a String Quartet Performance of a Bach Fugue: Design and Subjective Evaluation. Music & Science. 8. doi: 10.1177/20592043251352299. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Visualizing music—through music notation, analytical representations, or music videos—might potentially boost the appreciation of music in all its richness. The purpose of this study was to design and test a visualization strategy aimed at explicating to a large audience with diverse backgrounds—especially novices—the multifaceted beauty of the final Contrapunctus in J.S. Bach's The Art of Fugue, performed by the Danish String Quartet. At the surface level of the musical structure, the rich fluctuation of pitch shaped by each musician was depicted in the form of undulating pitch curves. At a deeper structural level, the repetition of pitch curves, distinctive of fugues, was highlighted through vertical alignment—inspired by a technique called paradigmatic analysis, originating from anthropology and music semiology. The visualization was initially prototyped in the form of a real-time technology as part of the MusicLab Copenhagen research concert. The concert audience focused on the performance itself, and did not pay much attention to, nor appreciate, the visualization. To evaluate more thoroughly the potential of the visualization, participants with varied musical expertise and taste were invited to listen to a recorded performance of the piece and watch the visualization on their own computer. A large majority reported that they felt they understood the visualization, around half of them felt that it enhanced their musical understanding, and a small group felt that it helped them to better appreciate the music.

• Simon Høffding, Rebecca Josefine Five Bergstrøm, Laura Bishop, Pedro Pablo Lucas Bravo, Kayla Burnim & Carlos Eduardo Cancino-Chacón [Show all 28 contributors for this article] (2025). Introducing the MusicLab Copenhagen Dataset. Music & Science. 8. doi: 10.1177/20592043241303288. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  MusicLab Copenhagen was a unique research concert featuring the world-renowned Danish String Quartet in a naturalistic setting. The audience was split between one group physically located in the hall, another group listening to a radio broadcast, and a third group watching a live stream. Qualitative and quantitative data were captured from both musicians and audiences, resulting in a comprehensive dataset that can be used to address many research questions. This document introduces the dataset, explains its structure, and reflects on the related data collection, storing, publishing, and archiving processes.

• Matthias Boeker, Dana Swarbrick, Ulysse Côté-Allard, Michael Riegler, Pål Halvorsen & Hugo Lewi Hammer (2024). Predictive Modelling of Muscle Fatigue in Climbing. In Rainer Lienhart, Thomas B. Moeslund & Hideo Saito (Ed.), MMSports '24: Proceedings of the 7th ACM International Workshop on Multimedia Content Analysis in Sports. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). ISSN 9798400711985. p. 7–15. doi: 10.1145/3689061.3689066. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Sport climbing, a discipline demanding high levels of muscular strength, endurance, and cognitive planning, has gained considerable popularity in recent years. The importance of managing muscle fatigue during climbing, which can substantially impair performance and potentially lead to injury, has not yet been thoroughly investigated. Predicting muscle fatigue can help to create tailored training programs and refine climbing strategies to optimise performance and safety. This study aimed to monitor and predict muscle fatigue during climbing.We conducted a multi-modal experiment involving 20 climbers, measuring their muscle activity and fatigue via electromyography (EMG) and tracking their climbing trajectories through video recordings. We compared different linear autoregressive process (AR) methods and machine learning methods that predict muscle fatigue up to 5 seconds into the future. We also successfully proposed to extend the AR model to account for expected muscle fatigue as a function of distance climbed. While this extension improved prediction over the standard AR model, with a Root mean square error (RMSE) of 16.05 (±28.42%), the nonlinear Multilayer perceptron (MLP) and Gradient boosting (GB) models outperformed linear methods, with a lower RMSE of 15.09 (±27.94%)and 15.09 (±29.02%), respectively. Despite their lower accuracy compared to non-linear models, the simplicity of calculating linear models could enable real-time predictions on wearable devices, providing climbers with valuable, immediate feedback on muscle fatigue. This capability can significantly impact climbing research by providing practical tools for real-world applications, improving climbers’ decision-making and enhancing safety and performance.

• Dana Swarbrick, Remy Richard Martin, Simon Høffding, Nanette Nielsen & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2024). Audience Musical Absorption: Exploring Attention and Affect in the Live Concert Setting. Music & Science. 7. doi: 10.1177/20592043241263461. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical absorption is a multi-dimensional phenomenon that has been understood in various ways, but is related to strong, immersive, and transformative musical encounters. For this exploratory article, we used a phenomenologically and psychologically informed questionnaire to measure audience members’ reports of musical absorption and affective experiences at the MusicLab Copenhagen research concert with the Danish String Quartet (DSQ). We aimed to examine the relation between musical absorption and (1) attention, mind-wandering, and senses of transformation; (2) affective phenomena of feeling moved or touched and awe; (3) social context, as determined by technological mediation of a livestream; (4) musical context (Beethoven, Schnittke, and folk music); and (5) motion. There were 91 participants in the live audience and 43 participants in the livestreaming audience, who completed questionnaires after each piece in the concert and who had their motion measured through an application that recorded accelerometer data from their smartphones. Drawing on methods from experimental psychology, we found that (1) being “absorbed in the music” was not related to mind-wandering, but it was related to a sense of positive transformation; (2) musical absorption was related to experiences of feeling moved, awe, connectedness, and enjoyment, and to being an “admirer” of the DSQ, as well as to being familiar with the music; (3) being at the live concert facilitated more musical absorption than watching the livestream; (4) the final concert section, containing a collection of folk tunes, promoted the most musical absorption; and (5) within the restrained movement dynamics of the live audience, motion trended as an indicator of an embodied experience of musical absorption. We use these results to engage in a phenomenologically informed and empirically enriched discussion of musical absorption and related affective and attentional dynamics.

• Dana Swarbrick & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2023). Collectively Classical: Connectedness, Awe, Feeling Moved, and Motion at a Live and Livestreamed Concert. Music & Science. 6. doi: 10.1177/20592043231207595. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Live concerts normally involve gathering at the same time and place. In livestreamed concerts, participants may gather in time but not in space, providing a natural comparison for studying live concert experiences. Previous research suggests that livestreamed concerts promote more social connectedness than pre-recorded concerts and that live concerts promote more movement than listening to recorded music in a group. However, to the best of our knowledge, a comparison between live and livestreamed concerts has not been conducted. The Danish String Quartet is a critically acclaimed music group who performed a live concert that was also livestreamed. The live and livestreaming audiences’ emotions were measured with surveys that collected data on connectedness, feeling moved, and awe after each piece. In addition, audience motion was measured with an application that recorded from the participants' own smartphones’ accelerometers. Survey responses were collected from 91 live and 32 livestreaming participants. Motion data was collected from 82 live and 25 livestreaming participants. While the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the livestreaming audience, both live and livestreaming audiences felt similarly connected to the performers. Feeling moved and awe were influenced by the piece of music, but not by the audience condition (i.e., live or livestreaming audience). During the classical Beethoven and Schnittke pieces, the live audience moved less, while during the folk tunes, the live audience moved more. The differences between pieces were smaller in the livestreaming audience. The live audience reported more connectedness to the audience when their neighbors moved more during the folk and less during the Beethoven and Schnittke. Connectedness with other audience members was also related to the amount that an individual stilled in response to key musical moments in the pieces. Together, these findings show that the classical concert audience actively engages with the music and the associated socioemotional experience based on genre-specific norms and expectations.

• Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham, Cagri Erdem, Alexander Refsum Jensenius & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2022). Measuring Virtual Audiences with The MusicLab App: Proof of Concept. In Romain Michon, Laurent Pottier & Yann Orlarey (Ed.), Proceedings of the 19th Sound and Music Computing Conference. SMC Network. ISSN 9782958412609. p. 532–539. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.6798290. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We present a proof of concept by using the mobile application MusicLab to measure motion during a livestreamed concert and examining its relation to musical features. With the MusicLab App, participants’ own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors can be leveraged to record their motion and their subjective experiences collected through survey responses. The MusicLab Lockdown Rave was an Algorave (live-coded dance music) livestreamed concert featuring prolific performers Renick Bell and Khoparzi. They livestreamed for an international audience who wore their smartphones with the MusicLab App while they listened/danced to the performances. From their acceleration, we computed quantity of motion and compared it to musical features that have previously been associated with music-related motion, namely pulse clarity and low and high spectral flux. By encountering challenges and implementing improvements, the MusicLab App has become a useful tool for researching music-related motion.

• Kelsey Onderdijk, Dana Swarbrick, Bavo Van Kerrebroeck, Maximillian Mantei, Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski & Pieter-Jan Maes [Show all 7 contributors for this article] (2021). Livestream Experiments: The Role of COVID-19, Agency, Presence, and Social Context in Facilitating Social Connectedness. Frontiers in Psychology. 12. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.647929. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Musical life became disrupted in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many musicians and venues turned to online alternatives, such as livestreaming. In this study, three livestreamed concerts were organized to examine separate, yet interconnected concepts—agency, presence, and social context—to ascertain which components of livestreamed concerts facilitate social connectedness. Hierarchical Bayesian modeling was conducted on 83 complete responses to examine the effects of the manipulations on feelings of social connectedness with the artist and the audience. Results showed that in concert 1, where half of the participants were allowed to vote for the final song to be played, this option did not result in the experience of more agency. Instead, if their preferred song was played (regardless of voting ability) participants experienced greater connectedness to the artist. In concert 2, participants who attended the concert with virtual reality headsets experienced greater feelings of physical presence, as well as greater feelings of connectedness with the artist, than those that viewed a normal YouTube livestream. In concert 3, attendance through Zoom led to greater experience of social presence, but predicted less connectedness with the artist, compared to a normal YouTube livestream. Crucially, a greater negative impact of COVID-19 (e.g., loneliness) predicted feelings of connectedness with the artist, possibly because participants fulfilled their social needs with this parasocial interaction. Examining data from all concerts suggested that physical presence was a predictor of connectedness with both the artist and the audience, while social presence only predicted connectedness with the audience. Correlational analyses revealed that reductions in loneliness and isolation were associated with feelings of shared agency, physical and social presence, and connectedness to the audience. Overall, the findings suggest that in order to reduce feelings of loneliness and increase connectedness, concert organizers and musicians could tune elements of their livestreams to facilitate feelings of physical and social presence.

• Dana Swarbrick, Christa Beate Seibt, Noemi Grinspun & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2021). Corona Concerts: The Effect of Virtual Concert Characteristics on Social Connection and Kama Muta. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.648448. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The popularity of virtual concerts increased as a result of the social distancing requirements of the coronavirus pandemic. We aimed to examine how the characteristics of virtual concerts and the characteristics of the participants influenced their experiences of social connection and kama muta (often labeled “being moved”). We hypothesized that concert liveness and the salience of the coronavirus would influence social connection and kama muta. We collected survey responses on a variety of concert and personal characteristics from 307 participants from 13 countries across 4 continents. We operationalized social connection as a combination of feelings and behaviors and kama muta was measured using the short kama muta scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019). We found that (1) social connection and kama muta were related and predicted by empathic concern, (2) live concerts produced more social connection, but not kama muta, than pre-recorded concerts, and (3) the salience of the coronavirus during concerts predicted kama muta and this effect was completely mediated by social connection. Exploratory analyses also examined the influence of social and physical presence, motivations for concert attendance, and predictors of donations. This research contributes to the understanding of how people can connect socially and emotionally in virtual environments.

• Niels Chr. Hansen, John Melvin Gudnyson Treider, Dana Swarbrick, Joshua S. Bamford, Johanna Wilson & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2021). A Crowd-Sourced Database of Coronamusic: Documenting Online Making and Sharing of Music During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Frontiers in Psychology. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.684083. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  When a sweeping COVID-19 pandemic forced cultural venues, schools, and social hangouts into hibernation in early 2020, music life relocated to the digital world. On social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok, sofas and balconies took center stage for musical performances presented as live-streamed concerts and recorded videos. Amateurs and professional musicians alike embraced digital formats and innovated novel genres of corona-themed music. Adapting the well-known “musicking” term from cultural musicology (Small, 1999), we will characterize the diverse practices of listening to, playing, dancing to, composing, rehearsing, improvising, discussing, exploring, and innovating musical products during lockdown with explicit or implicit reference to the novel coronavirus and/or pandemic life circumstances as “corona-musicking.” By extension, audiovisual products of such corona-musicking behavior will be defined collectively as “coronamusic.” To best facilitate future work, these definitions are intentionally broad and minimally exclusive (cf. Small, 1999). This study aims to establish the CORONAMUSIC DATABASE–a crowdsourced corpus of links to coronamusic videos and news media reports (https://osf.io/y7z28/). This constitutes the first readily accessible and searchable resource for researchers from all disciplines with an interest in documenting and investigating the musical dynamics underlying the pandemic.

• Dana Swarbrick, Alex Kiss, Sandra Trehub, Luc Tremblay, David Alter & Joyce Chen (2020). HIIT the Road Jack: An Exploratory Study on the Effects of an Acute Bout of Cardiovascular High-Intensity Interval Training on Piano Learning. Frontiers in Psychology. 11(2154). doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.02154. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Pairing high-intensity interval training (HIIT) with motor skill acquisition may improve learning of some implicit motor sequences (albeit with some variability), but it is unclear if HIIT enhances explicit learning of motor sequences. We asked whether a single bout of HIIT after non-musicians learned to play a piano melody promoted better retention of the melody than low-intensity interval training (LIIT). Further, we investigated whether HIIT facilitated transfer of learning to a new melody. We generated individualized exercise protocols by having participants (n = 25) with little musical training undergo a graded maximal exercise test (GXT) to determine their cardiorespiratory fitness (VO2peak) and maximum power output (Wmax). In a subsequent session, participants practiced a piano melody (skill acquisition) and were randomly assigned to a single bout of HIIT or LIIT. Retention of the piano melody was tested 1 hour, 1 day, and 1 week after skill acquisition. We also evaluated transfer to learning a new melody 1 week after acquisition. Pitch and rhythm accuracy were analyzed with linear mixed-effects modeling. HIIT did not enhance sequence-specific retention of pitch or rhythmic elements of the piano melody, but there was modest evidence that HIIT facilitated transfer to learning a new melody. We tentatively conclude that HIIT enhances explicit, task-general motor consolidation.

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• Dana Swarbrick & Suvi Saarikallio (2026). An Exploratory Study on How AI Song Generation Affects Emotions, Agency, Authenticity, Creativity, and Connectedness in Musicians and Nonmusicians. doi: https:/osf.io/pucj2. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Songwriting supports creative and emotional expression and social and emotional development through emotion regulation and wellbeing, self-esteem, and a stronger sense of identity. Recent advances in AI technology have provided access to music creation even for people without musical expertise, through AI song generation. We conducted an exploratory, single session study to examine these outcomes in participants attending public outreach events. 45 participants with varying musical proficiency were instructed to express themselves creatively and emotionally by `composing' a song with an AI music generator. They listened to their generated songs and completed a questionnaire measuring song evaluation, task engagement, emotional expression, agency, authenticity, creativity, and connectedness. These exploratory results suggest that more positive attitudes towards AI are related to greater connectedness, while more musical proficiency is related to lower authenticity and evaluation. Agency partially mediated the effects of emotional expression and engagement on authenticity, creativity, and connectedness. These exploratory results can be leveraged for future confirmatory research.

• Petrus Sillanpää & Dana Swarbrick (2026). Human, AI, or Both? How Composer Identity Shapes the Way We Connect with Music. doi: https:/www.jyu.fi/en/file-download/download/public/67529. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have enabled the creation of music that closely resembles human-composed works, raising questions about how listeners perceive and evaluate music. While prior research suggests listeners often exhibit a bias against AI-generated music, most studies have focused on aesthetic judgments such as liking or quality, leaving the social-emotional dimensions largely unexplored. This is a notable gap, given that music listening is fundamentally a social experience, deeply tied to feelings of connection with both the music and its creator. The present study investigated how purported composer identity influences listeners' appreciation, social-emotional responses, and behavioral intentions. Using a within-subjects experimental design, 75 adult participants listened to identical human-composed classical music excerpts labeled as either human-composed, AI-composed, or human–AI co-composed. By holding the musical material constant while manipulating composer identity, the study isolated the effects of cognitive and social biases related to AI involvement. Participants evaluated each excerpt on measures assessing appreciation, social connectedness to the composer and the music, emotional responses, and behavioral intentions. Data were analyzed using linear mixed-effects models. Results showed that perceived composer identity significantly affected most measures, with ratings decreasing as AI involvement increased. Crucially, feelings of connectedness—both to the composer and to the music—were affected, with AI-composed and human–AI co-composed music eliciting significantly lower connectedness to the composer and music than human-composed music. These findings highlight the deeply social nature of music and suggest that AI involvement disrupts not only aesthetic appreciation but also the human connection that makes music meaningful.

• Alexander Refsum Jensenius, Finn Upham, Agata Zelechowska, Victor Evaristo Gonzalez Sanchez, Dana Swarbrick & Maham Riaz (2026). micromotion: A Python toolbox for analysing human micromotion in motion time series. doi: 10.5281/zenodo.22080495. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Software. One implementation of quantity of motion — the average speed of a body part, band-limited to 0.2-5 Hz, in millimetres per second — for optical marker data, body-worn accelerometers and force-plate centre of pressure, together with the readers, resampling rules, scaling measures and alignment methods that surround it.

• Dana Swarbrick & Kjell Andreas Oddekalv (2024). LAB.prat: RITMO x Popsenteret Live & Livestreamed Concert with Dana & The Monsters and Conversation with Dr. Dana Swarbrick. Full text in Research Archive
• Kjell Andreas Oddekalv & Dana Swarbrick (2024). LAB.prat #1: Dr. Dana Swarbrick || Dana & The Monsters. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2023). Les Effets du Musique sur Grimper. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2023). The Effects of Music on Climbing. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Caroline Palmer, Peter Keller, Martin Clayton, Molly Henry & Petri Toiviainen (2023). Entrainment Workshop Panel Discussion. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Definitions of entrainment vary across disciplines including mechanics, behavioural psychology, neuroscience, and biology. Generally, entrainment involves the adjustment of rhythmic signals to each other. Neural entrainment and rhythmic entrainment are common terms to distinguish the types of entrainment that occur in the brain or behaviour, respectively. Some use the term emotional entrainment to describe how individuals align their emotions with one another. Can a single definition truly encompass all crucial elements and be used across disciplines or are these disciplines using the term in ways that are too different from each other to be unified? One general definition from empirical musicology is “the process by which independent rhythmical systems interact with each other” (Clayton, 2012). The importance of this definition is in specifying that the independent systems must generate their own, self-sustaining rhythmic fluctuations, and that entrainment is the process of their interaction and their adjustments, whether both adjust to each other (symmetrical) or one to another (asymmetrical) (ibid.). Coincidental alignment is not necessarily a marker of entrainment processes because measuring alignment does not imply that a system has adjusted to another (ibid.). Instead, measuring adjustments after perturbations may provide stronger evidence for entrainment (ibid.). Many of the measures used to capture entrainment capture some element of alignment, however they do not necessarily measure outcomes of perturbations. A panel discussion with experts on entrainment from various disciplines will aim to highlight the successes and shortcomings of the current body of literature on entrainment and how we can improve research and methods on this phenomenon. Questions will probe researchers’ definitions of entrainment and its correspondences and distinctions with other related phenomena including general coordination and synchrony. Finally, we will aim to highlight the gaps that still exist in the literature and how these can be addressed with the currently available methods.

• Dana Swarbrick & Andrew Roach (2023). What Are Concert Crowds Like? [Internet]. By the Barricade . Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2023). Exploring the Relationship Between Experiences of Awe, Being Moved, and Social Connectedness in Concert Audiences. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Anne Danielsen, Alexander Refsum Jensenius & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2023). The Effects of “Feeling Moved” and “Groove” On Standstill. Full text in Research Archive
• Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski & Dana Swarbrick (2023). Moving together: Exploring the relationship between emotions, connectedness, and motion in concert audiences. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Music is able to evoke experiences of being moved and a sense of social connectedness in audiences – even in the context of streamed concerts and recorded music. The present study set out to investigate audiences’ emotional experiences and amount of movement in a classical string quartet concert, which was attend by both a live (N=91) and a livestreaming (N=45) audience. The results revealed that both audiences felt similarly connected to the performers, while the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the livestreaming audience. Reports of ‘being moved’ and awe were influenced more by the piece of music than by the listening context, and the live audience demonstrated distinct motion patterns in response to different musical pieces. The amount of audience movement was also associated with the degree of connectedness experienced towards other audience members. In a follow-up online experiment, 189 participants continuously rated their experience of being moved while watching a recording of the Beethoven string quartet performance from the main concert experiment. Cross-correlations between the continuous ratings and musical features and audience movement patterns were analysed. Overall, the findings demonstrate that the degree of connectedness experienced towards other audience members is modulated by shared presence as well as the amount of audience movement, while experiences of ‘feeling moved’ and awe are influenced by the music itself.

• Dana Swarbrick, Dan Bosnyak, Susan Marsh Rollo, Nicole Fu, Laurel Trainor & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2023). Being in Concert: The Effects of Audience Participation on Motion, Emotion, and Connectedness. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2023). Being in Concert: Fostering Togetherness in Audiences. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick & Anna Moesgaard (2023). Selv når koncerter opleves gennem en skærm, mærker vi musikerne. [Journal]. Kristeligt Dagblad. Full text in Research Archive
• Olivier Lartillot, Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham & Carlos Eduardo Cancino-Chacón (2023). Video visualization of a string quartet performance of a Bach Fugue: Design and subjective evaluation. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2023). Song Talk Radio: Interview with Dana Swarbrick and Alex Whorms. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham, Cagri Erdem, Alexander Refsum Jensenius & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2022). Measuring Virtual Audiences with The MusicLab App: Proof of Concept. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We present a proof of concept by using the mobile application MusicLab to measure motion during a livestreamed concert and examining its relation to musical features. With the MusicLab App, participants’ own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors can be leveraged to record their motion and their subjective experiences collected through survey responses. The MusicLab Lock-down Rave was an Algorave (live-coded dance music) livestreamed concert featuring prolific performers Renick Bell and Khoparzi. They livestreamed for an international audience who wore their smartphones with the MusicLab App while they listened/danced to the performances. From their acceleration, we computed quantity of motion and compared it to musical features that have previously been associated with music-related motion, namely pulse clarity and low and high spectral flux. By encountering challenges and implementing improvements, the MusicLab App has become a useful tool for researching music-related motion.

• Louise Hermant & Dana Swarbrick (2022). Les concerts dans le métavers, un nouveau monde ? (Concerts in the Metaverse, a new world?). [Journal]. La Libre Belgique. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham, Stephen McAdams, Laurel Trainor & Julia Merrill (2022). Concert Experiment Research - Reflections on Past and Future. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  In the twenty years since the seminal concert experiments conducted by Stephen McAdams, many music cognition labs have invested resources and expertise into studying music in a concert setting. Such projects often involve collaborations between teams of researchers and artists, new technologies, challenging measurement conditions, and creative analysis strategies. As music science events, they can be very attractive to the popular press and yet difficult to report in academic circles. Complications from their bid for greater ecological validity can look like a weakness by laboratory standards, but such challenges to common practices and theories may also be a strength of this distinct research paradigm. In this moderated panel, we gather researchers with a range of experiences in researching musical concerts to share lessons learned and hopeful directions for this experimental paradigm. What should we expect to capture from musicians and audiences in these conditions? What research questions can and should be investigated with live performance and joint spectatorship? Can today’s technologies improve the methods used to conduct these studies? The symposium will include short presentations on past research with a focus on methods and strategy, some discussion of the main questions between the panelists, and a substantial portion of time devoted to discussion with the audience, as experience with concert studies is wider than the published record suggests. Specifically, the panel will consist of three sections: 1) introductions of the panelists’ expertise on concert experiment research, 2) question and answer period between panelists, and 3) an audience question period. The panel will consist of four leading researchers in the field of concert studies and it will be hosted by a doctoral researcher with expertise in the field.

• Dana Swarbrick & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2022). Collectively Classical: Social Connectedness at a Classical Concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Submission: Motivation: Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience. Live concerts are important sociocultural events that normally involve gathering at the same time and in the same space. In livestreamed virtual concerts, participants may gather in time, but not in space, providing a natural manipulation for studying concert experiences. Our previous research indicated that livestreamed virtual concerts can promote more social connectedness than pre-recorded virtual concerts. Additionally, live concerts promote more movement than listening to recorded music in a group. However, to the best of our knowledge, a comparison between live and virtual concerts and their effects on motion and emotion has not yet been conducted. Methodology: The Danish String Quartet is an acclaimed classical music group who performed a concert to both live and livestreaming audiences. Audience members were invited to participate by downloading a smartphone application that records motion with their own smartphones’ inertial measurement unit sensors. Survey responses were collected information on their experience of the music, social connectedness, and the sociorelational emotion of feeling moved before the concert and after each piece. Results: Survey responses were collected from 91 participants in the live audience and 67 participants in the livestreaming audience. Motion data was collected from 79 participants in the live audience and 34 from the livestreaming audience. While analyses are ongoing, preliminary results of the questionnaire data revealed that although the live audience felt more connected to other audience members than the virtual audience, both live and virtual audience members felt equally connected to the performers. Implications: This research contributes to the field of embodied music cognition by reinforcing the importance of the social nature of musical experiences.

• Dana Swarbrick & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2022). Collectively Classical: Social connection at a classical concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  We aimed to examine the difference between live and livestreamed concerts, the influence of musical piece, and participant characteristics such as empathy and fan-status on audience social connectedness and feeling moved. Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience. Concerts and the music featured there may facilitate connectedness and the sociorelational emotion kama muta (frequently labelled “feeling moved”) through a variety of mechanisms. Recent research suggests that in virtual concerts, both concert characteristics (e.g. liveness, technological platform) and individual characteristics (e.g. empathy, loneliness, concentration) influence feelings and behaviours associated with social connectedness (Swarbrick et al., 2021; Onderdijk, Swarbrick et al., 2021). Social bonding during collective music listening has previously been demonstrated in the context of dance (Tarr et al., 2016). Questions remain on how concert and personal characteristics influence social connectedness at a live concert and how the effects of live and virtual concerts differ. MusicLab Copenhagen was a concert experiment in which the Danish String Quartet performed to a live (n = 91) and a livestreaming audience (n = 45). Participants responded to questions on their personal characteristics and their social and emotional concert experiences using a questionnaire in response to three distinct pieces of music. Specifically, participants reported feelings of social connectedness that they felt towards the performers and the other audience members, and they responded to the kama muta scale. Although the live audience members felt more socially connected to other audience members than the virtual audience members, both live and virtual audience members felt similarly connected to the performers. There was also a main effect of the piece of music for both social connectedness and feeling moved such that these outcome measures were highest for the folk, then Beethoven, and then Schnittke. When examining awe, the main effect of piece was also present however with awe presenting an opposite trend, with Schnittke producing the highest levels of awe followed by Beethoven and then folk. This research has helped us understand the experience of live and virtual classical concert audiences. Furthermore, this research contributes to a burgeoning field comparing the effects of live and virtual experiences and the implications of their differences on our social well-being. Interdisciplinary implications. The MusicLab Copenhagen project was an interdisciplinary collaboration between psychologists, technologists, musicians, and philosophers. This project offered meaningful perspectives on the challenges and advantages of conducting research on such an interdisciplinary team. The MusicLab Copenhagen model could be employed by future research teams to get the most out of a concert experiment. In this particular study, we combine disciplinary expertise in social psychology and music cognition to better understand participants’ social experience of concerts. References Swarbrick, D., Seibt, B., Grinspun, N., and Vuoskoski, J. K. (2021). Corona Concerts: The Effect of Virtual Concert Characteristics on Social Connection and Kama Muta. Front. Psychol. 12, 1–21. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.648448. Onderdijk, K. E., Swarbrick, D., Van Kerrebroeck, B., Mantei, M., Vuoskoski, J. K., Maes, P. J., et al. (2021). Livestream Experiments: The Role of COVID-19, Agency, Presence, and Social Context in Facilitating Social Connectedness. Front. Psychol. 12, 1–25. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.647929. Tarr, B., Launay, J., and Dunbar, R. I. M. (2016). Silent disco: dancing in synchrony leads to elevated pain thresholds and social closeness. Evol. Hum. Behav. 37, 343–349. doi:10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2016.02.004.

• Dana Swarbrick & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2022). Collectively Classical: Social connection at a classical concert. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Background: Concerts are fundamentally social experiences in which an audience and musicians gather to witness and create an aesthetic experience, together. Concerts and the music featured there may facilitate connectedness and the sociorelational emotion kama muta (frequently labelled “feeling moved”) through a variety of mechanisms. Kama muta is considered a self-transcendent emotion as is awe (Yaden et al., 2017). Recent research suggests that in virtual concerts, both concert characteristics (e.g. liveness, technological platform) and individual characteristics (e.g. empathy, loneliness, concentration) influence feelings and behaviours associated with social connectedness (Swarbrick et al., 2021; Onderdijk, Swarbrick et al., 2021). Social bonding during collective music listening has previously been demonstrated in the context of dance (Tarr et al., 2016). Aims: In a live concert experiment, we aimed to examine how concert and personal characteristics influence social connectedness, kama muta, and awe at a live concert and how the effects of live and virtual concerts differ. Methods: MusicLab Copenhagen was a concert experiment in which the Danish String Quartet performed to a live (n = 91) and a livestreaming audience (n = 67). Participants listened to three distinct pieces of music and responded to a questionnaire that captured their personal characteristics and their social and emotional concert experience. Specifically, participants reported feelings of social connectedness that they felt towards the performers and the other audience members, and they responded to the kama muta scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) and to a selection of items from the awe experience scale (Yaden et al., 2019). Results: The live audience members felt more connected to other audience members than the virtual audience members, but both live and virtual audience members felt equally connected to the performers. The live and virtual audiences felt similar levels of kama muta and awe. However while the pieces of music showed similar effects on both social connectedness and kama muta, the pieces had an opposite effect on awe. Conclusions: Even though live concerts facilitate more togetherness among audience members than livestreamed concerts, livestreaming and virtual audience members experience similar levels of connectedness towards the performers, kama muta, and awe. This indicates that virtual concerts may still be useful tools for performers to strengthen their bonds with their fans. Implications: This research will help us to continue to uncover the benefits of concert attendance on audiences. Furthermore, this research contributes to a burgeoning field comparing the effects of live and virtual experiences and the implications of their differences on our social well-being.

• Dana Swarbrick & Alex Whorms (2022). LIVELab Concert Experiment - Audience Motion and Emotion - Effects of Participation and Shared Presence on Motion, Emotion, and Bonding. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  September 23rd, 2022, Alex Whorms and her band, Konrad Swierczek (bass), Nigel Stewart (drums), and Stephen Orr (guitar) performed for a concert experiment on audience motion and emotion. Lead researcher Dana Swarbrick, doctoral researcher at the University of Oslo's RITMO Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Rhythm, Time and Motion, delivered a Science Snapshot presentation on the research experiment. The live audience's head motion was measured with the LIVELab's motion capture system and both the live and livestreaming audiences had their body motion measured with MoCap hats and the MusicLab App. Both audiences filled surveys that measured their emotions.

• Dana Swarbrick (2022). Being in Concert: Audience Motion, Emotion, and Bonding. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  https://ictm-somos.github.io/Symposium-2022/program.html

• Nicole Fu, Dan Bosnyak, Susan Marsh Rollo, Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski, Laurel Trainor & Dana Swarbrick (2022). Being in Concert: The effects of audience participation on engagement, kama muta, and connectedness. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2021). Researching Live and Virtual Concert Audiences. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick & Kelsey Onderdijk (2021). Livestream Experiments During the Pandemic. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Kelsey Onderdijk (IPEM) and Dana Swarbrick (RITMO) will present their paper on three livestream concert experiments that were executed last summer. The main focus of these experiments was to explore how feelings of social connectedness can be fostered in virtual environments (i.e. livestreamed concerts), and to investigate how attending a virtual concert interacted with ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic (e.g., loneliness, anxiety). Three main concepts were under investigation: agency, presence, and social context, that each required a different setup. Results provided insights into the role of parasocial interactions, music as social surrogacy, and concepts best suited to facilitate social connectedness and alleviate loneliness.

• Dana Swarbrick (2021). Measuring the virtual concert experience: Social connection, emotion, and motion. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Virtual concerts grew in popularity during the coronavirus crisis. In a series of studies, we examined the effects of virtual concerts on social connection and motion. The Corona Concerts project gathered 300 survey responses to understand what concert characteristics promote social connection and kama muta (feeling moved). The Experimental Sessions project aimed to manipulate agency, presence, and social context to determine their effects on social connection in a virtual concert. The MusicLab Algorave project leveraged participants’ own mobile phones to measure their motion during a virtual concert. Together, these studies contribute to understanding social connection in virtual environments.

• Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham, Cagri Erdem, Kayla Burnim & Alexander Refsum Jensenius (2021). The MusicLab App – Exploring the usage of mobile accelerometry to measure audience movement and respiration. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2021). Queens Pub Concert. Full text in Research Archive
• Solveig Sørbø & Dana Swarbrick (2021). Dana Swarbrick on pandemusicology and her own music - Solveigs Speisa Musikk. [Radio]. Radiorakel (and distributed to Spotify). Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Dana Swarbrick is a singer-songwriter-scientist who over the past year aimed to understand how virtual concerts can make us feel connected despite being socially distanced as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. She discussed a little about each of her four projects in the field of pandemusicology. Dana also shared music from her latest single 'No Love Left', and performed two brand new songs for us live in the studio 'Where the Mountain Casts its Shadow' and 'Cinnamon'. Guest: Dana Swarbrick Host: Solveig Sørbø Technician: Ingmar Bob Nilsen First aired 20th April at radiOrakel

• Emma Shortall, Dana Swarbrick & Molly Humiston (2021). Pandemic Streaming: A Documentary. [Internet]. YouTube Documentary. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Produced by Molly Humiston and Emma Shortall, "Pandemic Streaming: The Rise of Live Streaming in the Music Industry", explores the expansion of live streaming over the course of the pandemic. Speaking with artists, fans, and those in between, we chart the use of live streaming and tap into where it's going next. 0:00 Introduction 2:27 Ch 1: Behind the Screens 13:21 Ch 2: The (Dis)Connection 27:28 Ch 3: You're Live 47:44 Credits

• Dana Swarbrick & Bjørn Egil Halvorsen (2021). Ny forskningsstudie: Musikk demper korona-fortvilelsen best. [Journal]. Aftenposten. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick & Kelsey Onderdijk (2021). Enhancing Digital Concerts: Social Connection, Presence, and Virtual Reality. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The coronavirus crisis led to unprecedented cancellation of concerts; however musicians responded rapidly by providing concerts online. To assess what aspects lead to social connectedness and feeling moved in virtual concerts, 307 participants responded to a survey reporting concert and personal characteristics (Study 1). Exploratory analyses suggested that physical presence explained 40% of the variance in feeling moved and social presence explained 27% of the variance of social connectedness. Therefore, manipulating feelings of presence may result in enhanced social experiences of digital concerts. This was put to the test in an experiment that consisted of three livestreamed concerts in which manipulations examined what might facilitate social connectedness (Study 2). Hierarchical Bayesian modelling was used to examine the effects of agency, social context, and presence on responses of 83 participants. Results revealed that physical presence was a predictor of connectedness with both the artist and the audience, while social presence only predicted connectedness with the audience. Interestingly, a greater negative impact of COVID-19 (e.g., loneliness) predicted feelings of connectedness with the artist (but not the audience), possibly because participants fulfilled their social needs with this parasocial interaction. Based on this study, the usage of virtual reality (VR) seems to be a promising tool. However, little is still known of concert experiences in VR. Thus, we will conclude with a short discussion on this topic based on a third study in which 74 participants responded to a survey to understand the (dis)advantages of this way of experiencing concerts (Study 3).

• Dana Swarbrick, Finn Upham, Cagri Erdem, Kayla Burnim & Alexander Refsum Jensenius (2021). MusicLab Algorave – An exploratory study examining the usage of mobile accelerometry to measure movements of a virtual concert audience. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick & Kelsey Onderdijk (2021). Livestream Experiments: The Role of COVID-19, Agency, Presence, and Social Context in Facilitating Social Connectedness. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2021). Being in Concert: Audience Motion, Emotion, and Bonding. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Noemi Grinspun, Beate Seibt & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2020). Virtually Together: Concerts during the Coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Dana Swarbrick, Beate Seibt, Noemi Grinspun & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2020). Virtually together: Concerts during the coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. Participants watched at least 15 minutes of an online concert and reported information on the concert characteristics, emotional and social outcomes, and their demographics, motivations, listening technologies, and musical experience. The main outcomes are the Kama Muta Scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) which measures feeling moved, and the social connectedness between the participant and the other attendees and performers. Mediation analyses will examine what aspects led to increased connectedness and feeling moved. 310 participants from 14 countries across the Americas (n = 212), Europe (n = 84), and Asia (n = 12) completed the survey. On average, participants reported on a 5-point scale that they felt moderately connected to the performer (M = 3.7), less connected to other audience members (M =2.3), and moderate feelings of being moved or touched (M = 3.7). Further mediation analyses will aim to understand what concert aspects led to these feelings. This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Dana Swarbrick, Noemi Grinspun, Beate Seibt & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2020). Quarantine Concerts. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Beate Seibt, Noemi Grinspun & Jonna Katariina Vuoskoski (2020). Virtually Together: Concerts during the Coronavirus. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  Background Government responses to the coronavirus led to unprecedented social distancing measures across the world. These measures were challenging for many; however, musicians adapted quickly by providing online virtual concerts. Anecdotally, viewers commented that virtual concerts made them feel socially connected despite the restrictions and the technologically mediated interactions. Little research has previously examined engagement at virtual concerts (Pursiainen, 2016), and to the best of our knowledge, no research has specifically examined which aspects of virtual concerts promote feelings of togetherness and being moved. Aims We aimed to examine what aspects of the virtual concert experience and participant characteristics 1) make people feel socially connected and 2) make people feel moved. Method Participants watched at least 15 minutes of an online concert and reported information on the concert characteristics, emotional and social outcomes, and their demographics, motivations, listening technologies, and musical experience. The main outcomes are the Kama Muta Scale (Zickfeld et al., 2019) which measures feeling moved, and the social connectedness between the participant and the other attendees and performers. Mediation analyses will examine what aspects led to increased connectedness and feeling moved. Results 310 participants from 14 countries across the Americas (n = 212), Europe (n = 84), and Asia (n = 12) completed the survey. On average, participants reported on a 5-point scale that they felt moderately connected to the performer (M = 3.7), less connected to other audience members (M =2.3), and moderate feelings of being moved or touched (M = 3.7). Further mediation analyses will aim to understand what concert aspects led to these feelings. Conclusions This research addresses the topical question of how people can feel socially connected in a time of social distancing. Both performing artists and societies can benefit from what this study might reveal about the online concert experience.

• Kristin Nagy Nordmark & Dana Swarbrick (2020). Karentenekonserter gir viktige sosiale opplevelser. Apollon : Forskningsmagasin for Universitetet i Oslo. ISSN 0803-6926. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2020). Nyhetsmorgen - radio (https://radio.nrk.no/serie/nyhetsmorgen/NPUB32010920?fbclid=IwAR07rA_odCCwd4tiHJDMLoNp7BWteHgosBJw9qi7_jna0u2SXbZJ5zw0OGk#t=1h14m30s). [Radio]. NRK radio. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Henriette Bertheussen Isachsen & Maiken Svendsen (2020). Koronakonsertene har 2 millioner avspillinger - Kan være utfordrende for artistene. [Internet]. NRK. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick, Alex Kiss, Luc Tremblay, Catherine Sabiston, Sandra Trehub & David Alter [Show all 7 contributors for this article] (2019). HIIT the Road Jack: The Effects of Exercise on Piano Learning. Full text in Research Archive
• Dana Swarbrick (2023). Being in Concert: Audience Emotion, Motion, and Social Connectedness. Universitetet i Oslo. Full text in Research Archive Show summary

  The aim of this doctoral dissertation is to examine audience socioemotional experiences and body motion at concerts, and to determine which concert and individual characteristics make audiences feel connected to each other and the performers. Perspectives from embodied music cognition and social psychology informed the design of 5 empirical studies, reported in 6 papers. Surveys and accelerometry collected audience motion, emotion, and connectedness at a number of concerts to understand the effects of technological mediation, liveness, and the music. The findings demonstrate that live and livestreamed concerts promote similar levels of connectedness between audiences and performers, but live concerts facilitate more connectedness among audiences. Across both live and livestreamed concerts, relationships between audience members and performers (as family, friends, or fans), promoted greater feelings of connectedness. Across concert types, states of attention, presence, and musical absorption facilitated stronger socioemotional experiences. In a live concert context, findings revealed that audiences are active participants in their social experiences, as the behavioural norms of the genre of music (and not just the concert) dictated how their peers’ motion made them feel connected. Physical stilling in response to meaningful musical moments was also related to feelings of connectedness, which hints that entrained musical behaviours of restrained action can also facilitate bonding. Personality traits of empathy and absorption facilitated kama muta and awe, respectively, and experiences of awe led to less motion. Taken together, the results of this doctoral dissertation suggest that live and virtual concerts can promote socioemotional experiences of social connectedness, kama muta, and awe. Motion can reflect and influence these socioemotional experiences. To harness concerts’ full potential to promote connectedness among members of the audience, it is important that they are experienced live.

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