Lauren Hayes

Discipline: 
Researcher
Music Practitioner
Musician/artist
Educator
Organization/Affiliation (no abbreviation): 
Arizona State University
Location: 
Tempe, AZ 85281
United States
Short biography and a description of your interest(s) in music and health: 
Lauren Hayes is a musician, improviser, and sound artist who builds and performs with hybrid analogue/digital instruments. She is Assistant Professor of Sound Studies within the School of Arts, Media and Engineering at Arizona State University where she founded the research group Practice and Research in Enactive Sonic Arts (PARIESA). Her research centers around embodied and enactive music cognition, enactive approaches to digital instrument design, and haptic technologies. As a performer and improviser, Hayes explores new strategies for live electronic performance by investigating the performer's physical relationship with the digital realm. Her music lies somewhere between free improv, experimental pop, techno, and noise, and she regularly performs internationally, including at major electronic music festivals such as Moogfest (USA) and Norberg (Sweden). Commissions include EFG London Jazz Festival (2015); four sold-out solo performances for Sonica Festival (2016) in Hamilton Mausoleum, UK, famous for holding the record for the longest echo of any man-made structure; a live BBC Radio 3 broadcast performance for hcmf// as part of its International Showcase (2017); and a co-commissioned work by hcmf// and University of Huddersfield's FluCoMa project (2019). Hayes composes haptic music that can be experienced as vibration throughout the body, and has given multisensory workshops for various groups, including those with sensory impairment, learning difficulties, and autism. Her person-centered approaches often result in custom built instruments designed specifically for a user. Over the last decade, she has developed bespoke haptic technologies, which has led to current research projects which include investigating the aesthetics of touch, and improving music perception for people who experience hearing loss. She was recently invited to share this research at Ableton's LOOP festival in Berlin (2017).
Keywords: 
haptics, performance, improvisation, embodiment, embodied music cognition, perception, technology