Many Voices: A world music podcast

*SPECIAL GUEST EPISODE (Season 1 finale - stay tuned for Season 2 with improved technology starting in a few weeks/months!)* Several future guests had to reschedule their Many Voices interviews, and my daughter had encouraged me to try being the interviewee rather than the interviewer. So we decided to take advantage of the break between regular guests to record a special interview with my kids Ka...

Kia ora, こんにちは, hello and welcome to Many Voices: A world music podcast. Some call music “the universal language” - but how many songs do you know in one of the world’s 6,000+ languages besides English? Every week, I ask a guest who speaks one of those languages to share six songs from their own culture, and their thoughts on the science behind the world’s musical diversity. I’m your host, Dr...

For today’s episode of “Many Voices”, I was delighted to welcome our guest, Brenda Suyanne Barbosa, to teach us about the Guaraní music of her culture. Born in Brazil, Brenda has recently moved to Germany to pursue a PhD at the University of Music Franz Liszt Weimar, where she is also a Research Associate in Transcultural Studies. I’ve previously collaborated with Brenda on scientific experiments...

For today’s episode of “Many Voices”, I was delighted to get to chat in person with Dr Nori Jacoby (https://norijacoby.com) from Cornell University while we were both in the Netherlands for a symposium about music and evolution. I enjoyed hearing Nori share music from his own performance of thousand-year-old songs to contemporary songs adapting rap to teach the ancient Hebrew alphabet. Nori is one...

For today’s episode of “Many Voices”, I was delighted to welcome our guest, Dr Gakuto Chiba, to teach us about min’yo (folk songs) and other music from Japan. Gakuto had just graduated a few days earlier with his PhD from Keio University Shonan Fujisawa Campus, where I had the honour to be his PhD supervisor. But Gakuto is not just a researcher - he is also the reigning national champion on the Ts...

For the first episode of “Many Voices: A world music podcast”, I sat down with Society for Music Perception and Cognition President Professor Psyche Loui while we were both in the Netherlands for a symposium about music and evolution. Born in Hong Kong, Psyche has become one of the world’s leading neuroscientists of music, while still staying active performing the violin. I enjoyed hearing Psyche...

For today’s episode of Many Voices, I was delighted to welcome our guest, Mark Lenini Parselelo, to tell us about the music of his Maasai community. Born in Kenya, Mark moved to Canada to pursue a PhD in Ethnomusicology at Memorial University of Newfoundland. I really enjoyed hearing Mark share music ranging from traditional Maasai lullabies learned from his grandmother, to the jumping adumu dance...

For today’s episode of “Many Voices”, I was delighted to welcome Danya Pavlovich to teach us about Māori waiata (or songs) from Aotearoa New Zealand. Danya is a PhD candidate in the School of Psychology at Waipapa Taumata Rau / the University of Auckland in Aotearoa New Zealand. Danya has helped lead global experiments measuring relationships between singing and social bonding across dozens of dif...