Music Research Institute (MRI)

The Music Research Institute was established in 2004 within the School of Music at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Our mission is to conduct research that advances the understanding of music and to share new knowledge for the good of society.

Research projects are organized in the following six areas: biomusic, neuroimaging, music-related hearing loss, music education, music performance, and ethnomusicology. This cluster of topics, integrated into an overarching institute, provides for a rich array of multi- and interdisciplinary research involving many scholars from within the School of Music, across the university, and from local, regional, national, and international research communities. More than 30 research projects are underway at this time.

Although the currently active research projects cover a broad spectrum, the over-arching conception is to understand the phenomenon of music. Much of the research is basic research designed to aid in understanding deep, underlying structures of musicality (e.g., studying musicality in bonobo apes or monitoring brain activations in musicians). Other research is more applied and will lead to specific interventions (e.g., the use of hearing protection for musicians at risk of permanent hearing loss), or teaching methodologies (e.g., enabling new music teachers to be more sensitive to cultural differences in the classroom). Regardless of the type of research being conducted, each project generates new knowledge that contributes to a deeper understanding of music.