Wellness Dome sessions provide public immersive sound display

An ASU professor who specializes in sound has created an immersive display open to the public. Garth Paine, a professor of digital sound and interactive media in the School of Arts, Media and Engineering at ASU, created the bioacoustics recorders to analyze species density.

Paine travels around the world to collect specialized audio recordings. Now his recordings of life in the rainforest are available to the entire community at free listening sessions on ASU’s Tempe campus.

The one-hour Wellness Dome sessions are held in the ASU ambisonic dome, a metal framework with 45 speakers creating an immersive audio experience.

The event is a project of the Acoustic Ecology Lab in the School of Arts, Media and Engineering, which Paine co-directs with Sabine Feisst, a professor in the School of Music, Dance and Theatre.

Paine said research has shown that connecting with nature can speed healing and create a sense of well-being.

People don’t typically pay close attention to sounds, he said.

“But when we direct our attention to listening, it means that we have to be here now because sound only happens here and now, wherever we are. And that’s a profound thing,” Paine said.

The Wellness Dome listening sessions allow the participants to relax, work on their laptops and do yoga while listening to the sounds of the Ecuadorian rainforest.

“It’s a space where people can just come and be present in that sound field, and just relax,” Paine said.

The room is darkened, with gentle coloured lights, pillows and chairs to relax.

The sounds include all of the life in the rainforest, birds, insects, frogs and mammals, so there’s chirping, buzzing, hooting and screeching, plus the gurgling of water and the occasional murmuring of humans.