To everyone resonating with music, health, and identity—

As we begin 2026, Resonances opens the year by returning to a fundamental question: how music accompanies us not only artistically, but physically and emotionally as well. Across cultures and throughout history, sound has been used to regulate, to soothe, and to heal—long before science had language for its effects on the body and the nervous system. This idea guides the first episode of the podcast, Was Music the First Medicine?—a reflection on the possibility that healing may have begun with listening.

This new year also brings movement and encounter. In the coming weeks, I’ll be traveling across the United States, and I’m truly looking forward to meeting many of you on the road and continuing these conversations in person.

Let’s dive in.

Was Music the First Medicine?

Why has sound been used as a tool for healing across cultures and throughout history? And what does modern neuroscience reveal about this ancient practice?

In this episode of Resonances I explore the deep and enduring relationship between music and medicine—from prenatal life and ritual practices to Pythagoras, Renaissance physicians, and contemporary neuroscience.

Drawing on biology, history, and clinical research, this episode examines how sound interacts with the nervous system, regulates emotion, modulates pain and stress, and shapes our experience of health. What ancient cultures understood intuitively, science is now beginning to explain.

🎧 Listen now on Spotify, YouTube, and all major podcast platforms.

🧠 Why This Episode Matters

Music is often treated as entertainment or metaphor. Yet across history, it has also functioned as a regulatory tool—acting on the body, the brain, and our social bonds.

This episode sets the tone for the year: listening to music not as background noise, but as a biological, cultural, and ethical force in human life. How we listen, what we listen to, and whose voices we center all have consequences—for health, for identity, and for the kind of societies we build.

January

The conversation continues in person. In the coming weeks, I’ll be traveling across the United States for residencies, lectures, masterclasses, and collaborative work, bringing the dialogue between music, health, and identity into classrooms, studios, and rehearsal spaces.

I’ll be visiting:

• University of Oregon > January, 19 - 23, 2026

• University of California, Riverside - 01.28.2026

• Orange County School of the Arts - Jan. 29, 2026

• Los Angeles Opera - Workshop, 01.30.2026

Each stop is an opportunity to think, sing, listen, and exchange ideas together—through repertoire, research, and shared experience. These encounters are where theory meets practice, and where music becomes a living, collective act.

If you’re nearby, I would love to see you along the way.

To follow the journey, behind-the-scenes moments, and conversations on the road, you can find me on Instagram. Let’s stay connected as the dialogue continues.

Thank you for being here—for listening, learning, and resonating. Whether you sing, read, reflect, or share, you are part of a growing community that believes in the power of sound to connect and transform.

Until next time, abrazos!

Patricia 💫
Follow me on Spotify | Follow me on Instagram | Join the BFOS Follow me on Linkedin | Follow me on Academia  | Subscribe to Resonances the Podcast