Since the FDA added a black-box
warning to Ambien and other
sleep aids last year, signifying
serious risks, insomniacs have
begun looking for drug-free ways
to sleep—and some musicians
and scientists think music could
be just as effective. Over the
past few years, sleep music has
slipped into the mainstream, with
ambient artists collaborating
with music therapists, apps
churning out hundreds of hours of
new content, and sleep streams
surging in popularity on YouTube
and Spotify. Scientists are delving
deeper into the field; in September,
the National Institutes of Health
awarded $20 million to research
projects around music therapy and
neuroscience. And since the rise of
the corona virus, demand for sleep
music has soared even higher.
Through the mid 20th century,
sleep music was mostly confined
to the fringes of Western
culture. Experimental minimalist
composers like John Cage, William
Relying on similar research
and working with neuroscientists,
Middleton began devising music
in which each element—harmony,
rhythm, frequency, environmental
noise—was chosen based on
scientific underpinnings. In
2018, he released Sleep Better,
an eight-part suite that features
lapping waves, chirping birds and
sustained synthesizer chords
designed to line up with your
circadian rhythms and encourage
deep REM sleep, which is thought
to help turn short-term memories
into long-term ones.MEANWHILE, the rise of stream-
ing has allowed for continuous
listening through the night;
Spotify created an entire sleep
vertical with 42 playlists. A larger
cultural shift favoring “wellness”
and mental health brought medi-
tation and mindfulness to the
mainstream in Western society.
Now, multi million-dollar apps like
Calm are partnering with musi-
cians, including Middleton, to
create scientifically designed new
sleep music.
Since the beginning of the
pandemic, Calm has seen their
daily downloads double. Endel,
a platform that creates sound
environments using artificial
intelligence, says that their
app installs have grown by
80%. Basinski, the minimalist
composer, says his streaming
royalties doubled from March to
April. And after being inundated
by requests from longtime
listeners, Rich created a beatific
album, Offering to the Morning
Fog. “There could not be a better
antidote to COVID-19 than this
blissful, serene soundscape,” one
commenter wrote on Bandcamp.
More studies are needed
to see if music can rival the
effectiveness of medicine, but the
anecdotal evidence is there. “A
sleeping pill is a sedative hypnotic
that influences our brain. Can we
use sound to rewire the brain and
make us feel drowsy? Yes,” says
Middleton. “The main challenge
is if we can keep people in the
various states of sleep, such as
restorative delta-wave sleep.”Basinski and Robert Rich created
serene, repetitive music in all-night
concerts that explored the edges of
consciousness.
But other musicians began to
delve into sleep music for more
functional reasons. In the ’90s,
the musician Tom Middleton
was sleep-deprived after years
of touring. He found studies that
showed relaxing music can affect
the parasympathetic nervous
system, which helps the body relax
before sleep. One trial in a Taiwan
hospital found that older adults
who listened to 45 minutes of
relaxing music before bedtime fell
asleep faster, slept longer and were
less prone to waking up during the
night.
Barbara Else, a senior adviser
with the American Music Therapy
Association, says music can play
a crucial role in quelling racing
thoughts and establishing routines.
“We can see respiration rate and
pulse settle down. We can see
blood pressure lower,” she says.A little night music
IN AN
ANXIOUS
ERA, THE
DEMAND
FOR
SOOTHING
MUSIC HAS
SOARED,
PUSHING
THE FIELD
INTO NEW
TERRITORY
By Andrew
R. Chow