about kelly lockwood
I became interested in music at an early age and started playing violin at 8. I played in school and community orchestras, sang in school choirs and with the Oakland Youth Chorus, but many violin and piano lessons later at the age of 18, I quit all music. I was frustrated by my lack of understanding and connection regarding music and the spiritual world. I was being taught music in a strictly academic way that did not fit with my experience. I turned to visual arts and received a degree in ceramics from SF State (June 1991) at the same time that I completed a program in energy work at Psychic Horizons. Upon graduating I moved to Oregon and lived in a yurt in the country while I worked as a ceramic artist with my business One Eye Designs.
It was in Oregon that I began playing the violin again at barn jam sessions, something that I had never done before. Improvising was liberating and opened me up to how much I missed music. One day on the car radio, I heard an interview on New Dimensions Radio with Therese Schroeder Sheker, the founder of music-thanatology. I thought, "This is amazing work, I think that's what I'll do when I'm older." I was thinking in my 60's, but the next year, at the ripe age of 32 I packed up my two cats and drove to Missoula Montana to participate in The Chalice of Repose Project at St. Patrick's Hospital.
A real healing took place for me in the Big Sky State, as I was encouraged to just be with one note. Music was taught through deep listening. Music was experienced as a shimmering force in the universe and a guide through thresholds and liminal spaces. This gave me an understanding of what I had always known yet could not articulate at 18. Music was taught in a way that encouraged intimacy, presence and space to commune with something beyond our small selves. I wrote my thesis for certification (January 2001) on the practice of musical meditation and how this personal experience informs working with people who are dying.
Upon returning to the Bay Area I have worked to integrate my skills as a music-thanatologist personally and professionally. My own personal losses have informed my professional understanding of living and dying. At times all I know to do is play some music and let this formless experience guide me to a larger framework. I want to thank everyone who has allowed me into their hearts during such fragile and personal times as the dying of a love one.