Mission Statement

Deep Listening Institute, Ltd. fosters a unique approach to music, literature, art and meditation, and promotes innovation among artists and audience in creating, performing, recording and educating with a global perspective.

What is Deep Listening?

Deep Listening® is a philosophy and practice developed by Pauline Oliveros that distinguishes the difference between the involuntary nature of hearing and the voluntary selective nature of listening. The result of the practice cultivates appreciation of sounds on a heightened level, expanding the potential for connection and interaction with one's environment, technology and performance with others in music and related arts.

The practice of Deep Listening provides a framework for artistic collaboration and musical improvisation and gives composers, performers, artists of other disciplines, and audiences new tools to explore and interact with environmental and instrumental sounds.

The Deep Listening Institute fosters creativity in artists of all ages and levels of artistic development by holding workshops and retreats; performing and publishing new work; and developing new performance technologies. 

Books on Deep Listening:

Deep Listening: A Composers' Sound Practice by Pauline Oliveros
Listening in Dreams by Ione

Pauline Oliveros

Executive Director

Pauline Oliveros (1932) has influenced American music extensively in her career spanning more than 60 years as a composer, performer, author and philosopher. She pioneered the concept of Deep Listening, her practice based upon principles of improvisation, electronic music, ritual, teaching and meditation, designed to inspire both trained and untrained musicians to practice the art of listening and responding to environmental conditions in solo and ensemble situations. During the mid-'60s she served as the first director of the Tape Music Center at Mills College, aka Center for Contemporary Music followed by 14-years as Professor of Music and 3 years as Director of the Center for Music Experiment at the University of California at San Diego. Since 2001 she has served as Distinguished Research Professor of Music  in the Arts department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) where she is engaged in research on a National Science Foundation CreativeIT project. Her research interests include improvisation, special needs interfaces and telepresence teaching and performing. She also serves as  Darius Milhaud Composer in Residence at Mills College doing telepresence teaching and she is  executive director of Deep Listening Institute, Ltd. where she leads projects in Deep Listening, Adaptive Use Interface. She is the recipient of the 2009 William Schuman Award from Columbia University for lifetime achievement.  A retrospective from 1960 to 2010 was performed at Miller Theater, Columbia University in New York March 27, 2010 in conjunction with the Schuman award. She received a third honorary degree from DeMontort University, Leicester, UK July 23, 2010. Recent recordings include Pauline Oliveros & Miya Masaoka and Pauine Oliveros & Chris Brown on Deep Listening.
        Website | MySpace | Blog

All Releases by Pauline Oliveros

Ione

Artistic Director

Ione is an author, playwright and poet whose works include the critically acclaimed memoir, Pride of Family Four Generations of American Women of Color, Nile Night, Remembered Texts from The Deep, Listening in Dreams and This is a Dream! She is the playwright and director of Njinga the Queen King, the dance opera Io and Her and the Trouble with Him, She is the director and writer of The Lunar Opera; Deep Listening For_Tunes, and Dreams of the Jungfrau, an experimental narrative film shot high in the Swiss Alps.

Ione is also an improvising spoken word performer and sound artist who performs frequently in the United States and internationally. A dedicated educator and counselor who specializes in dreams and the creative process, Ione conducts seminars and retreats throughout the world. She is the Director of the Ministry of Maåt, Inc an organization specializing in women and community and she is the Artistic Director of Deep Listening Institute, Ltd. .   

    Website | Ministry of Maåt

All Releases by Ione