This is one of the data sonification, and data-driven generative composition, experiments, I've been working on recently.  In this piece I used the Living Planet Index dataset (https://livingplanetindex.org/projects?main_page_project=AboutTheIndex&home_flag=1). The index gives a single measure of biodiversity across the world. It started at 100 in 1970, and fell to 32 by 2016.

Below are more details of how the Living Planet Index shaped the music.

* Each year (between 1970 and 2016) is represented by 2 bars of music. The start of the year is noted by the faint kick(-ish) drum sound.
* The Living planet index is mapped to the probability that each of the piano notes plays (it is the same loop throughout). So, the music gets sparser as the index falls over time.
* The index is also mapped to the stereo width of the mix (so it becomes narrower over time). This is more apparent when listening on headphones.
* The index is inverse mapped to the amount of distortion/saturation on the piano. To try and give a sense of ecosystems becoming more frayed.
* The index is mapped to the cutoff of a low pass filter on the ambient nature sounds. So, they are pushed back in the mix as the index falls.

The Living Planet Index (sketch - not mixed or mastered)

Karen continues recalibrating the 8 basic movement lessons in the book Somatics, by Thomas Hanna. In this class she focuses on the fourth lesson, pp. 116-122, controlling the muscles involving trunk rotation. She continues to brilliantly update some of the language, content, and choice of movement examples based on her experience working with clients and teaching classes.  

After some guided assessment in standing, she had us lie down on the floor. Most of this session was done in supine. Karen is very precise in her instructions which helps us to pay attention to how we are organizing ourselves. Her guidance often leads us to challenge our expectations which may confront our comfort levels and our habituated patterns. This lesson can feel quite complicated because it has so many parts. I personally liked how she focused on the essence of this lesson which ultimately leads to greater awareness of how we are organizing our contralateral patterning most associated with walking.

9/6/25: Zoom Class: Recalibration of Lesson 4 from "Somatics" by T. Hanna, Guest Teacher Karen Meyer

I hope you watch this video many times. One of Lisa's goals is to help you prepare for sitting on the floor. For many people, especially as we get older, we are just not comfortable sitting on the floor. In a future followup class Lisa will actually take us into sitting on the floor; in this class we do not do that yet. However, practicing these movements may have a profound effect on your mobility in your hips, pelvis and related myofascia, such as the tensor fascia lata (TFL). Lisa expertly builds our ability to add greater levels of movement complexity without any sense of being rushed or moving outside of our comfort zone. Enjoy! 

You may contact Lisa directly: flourish@clearsightyoga.com

10/4/25: Zoom Class: Lower Extremities: Hip, Pelvis, TFL with Guest Presenter Lisa Sack

anchoring practice oct 25

choiceless awarness (with optional anchor)

Karen continues recalibrating the 8 basic movement lessons in the book Somatics, by Thomas Hanna. In this class she focuses on the fifth lesson, pp. 123-128, controlling the muscles involving the pelvis, hip joints and legs. She continues to brilliantly update some of the language, content, and choice of movement examples based on her experience working with clients and teaching classes.  

Along with some guided assessment in standing and walking, we paid attention to where we were focusing our eyes, as a way of not only noticing our habitual use of our eye gaze, but also as a way of monitoring how we positioned our head on our neck.

Karen began the floor work with micro movements of the head and neck. This created a wonderful balance to the lower body work which took up the majority of our class.

This lesson involves moving and noticing how we organize and coordinate our feet, knees, hips and pelvis in relationship to the rest of our body. We worked with the foot movements of inversion and eversion, which involves turning the bottom of the feet inward and outward. How we organize our feet predicts how we organize our whole lower extremity and on up into the rest of our body. Karen's slow and careful guidance not only builds our awareness but also often challenges our ability to organize ourself in comfort and without force.

You will gain many insights by repeating this lesson.

11/1/25: Zoom Class: Recalibration of Lesson 5 from "Somatics" by T. Hanna, Presented by Karen Meyer

Gabriel Posner guided us through a fantastic class. First let me plug his new book, Somatic Techniques for Massage Therapists, available January 21, 2026. Gabriel is also the president of the Association for Hanna Somatic Education, and a teacher in Martha Peterson's Essential Somatics® trainings.

In this class Gabriel uses the concept of "relative conjugate movement" which Yochanan Rywerant, brilliantly explains in his book The Feldenkrais Method: Teaching by Handling. 

Gabriel discussed how easy it is for us to habituate the way we not only move in life, but also the way we practice our somatic movements. A wonderful way to vary how we practice our daily somatic movements is to reverse how we usually initiate our movements. For example, instead of rolling our arm inward and outward with a free hand, we can stabilize our palm against the side of our body and now roll our arm inward and outward. This changes the movement in surprising ways and activates the proximal end, the shoulder end, of the movement. 

I hope you do this class many times and reap the freedom and flexibility you will probably experience by reversing distal to proximal for proximal to distal movement. This is the concept Rywerant calls "relative conjugate movement."

12/6/25: Zoom: Reversing Distal to Proximal Movement & Vice Versa, Guest Presenter Gabriel Posner

Karen continues recalibrating the 8 basic movement lessons in the book Somatics, by Thomas Hanna. In this class she focuses on the sixth lesson, pp. 129-136, Controlling the Muscles of the Neck and Shoulders. She continues to brilliantly update some of the language, content, and choice of movement examples based on her experience working with clients and teaching classes.  

After a brief standing assessment, we laid down on the floor and Karen guided us through a wonderful warmup based on the basic cat routine. When doing this lesson, starting with a thorough warmup is very important because the sitting-on-the-floor position is usually practiced with less frequency. Karen emphasized eye movements with many of these actions. Combining eye movements with variations in head, neck, chest, arm, and pelvic movements is quite challenging for many. 

Just a cautionary note, as you follow this lesson please remember not only to move your body in comfort, but to move your eyes in comfort. It's quite easy to over do the eye movements which can cause eye strain. In our computer, driving culture we have often learned to limit our eye movements. Practicing Lesson 6 as Karen has guided it offers a wonderful variety of eye-body movements.

You will gain many insights by repeating this lesson.

1/3/26: Zoom Class: Recalibration of Lesson 6 from "Somatics" by T. Hanna, Presented by Karen Meyer

Jacqui guided us in a fabulous class and I hope you do this class many times. She focused on different regions of the body, starting with the head-neck, coming into the pelvis, next into the feet, and finally into the rib basket. She masterfully had us move in different directions such as up and down, side to side and finally into a circle. Periodically she would call our attention to other areas of our body that were automatically moving and supporting the various circular variations. Many participants commented that they had never moved their feet or their rib basket into these patterns, and were surprised at the level of focus and coordination involved. Jacqui was very creative in guiding us to transform our circles into spirals or figure-8s, moving between simplicity and complexity throughout our whole soma. Everyone seemed surprised to learn their level of adaptability or difficulty with these movement patterns. Please enjoy this class again and again!

2/7/26: Zoom: Moving Somatically in Circles, Spirals and Figure-8s, Guest Presenter Jacqui Neurauter

Karen continues recalibrating the 8 basic movement lessons in the book Somatics, by Thomas Hanna. In this class she focuses on the seventh lesson, pp. 137-144, Improving Breathing. She continues to brilliantly update some of the language, content, and choice of movement examples based on her experience working with clients and teaching classes. Karen briefly discussed the importance of efficient breathing both in terms of movement and physiology. She discussed a terrific book, "Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art" by James Nestor.  

After a brief standing and walking assessment, we laid down on the floor. Karen skillfully guided us through a series of "Arch & Flattens" in which we focused on the relationship between our breathing and this movement pattern. We were guided through various breathing movement patterns from different positions on the floor. In these various positions we were able to bring our attention to areas of our rib basket and lungs, as well as other areas of our body, and experience how our breath was received and filled different nooks and crannies in our chest, back, neck and shoulders, and other areas we personally experienced. Breathing movements are a wonderful way to explore therapeutic benefits for many conditions including asthma, scoliosis, pain, and much more. I hope you enjoy this fabulous class!

The Living Planet Index (sketch - not mixed or mastered)

chrismartin

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