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Free Online Talk · Harp Music, Death, and the Healing Threshold: From Dying Monks to Modern Deathbeds with Author Jane Franz and Music-Thanatologist Kate Davis
Monday, October 27, 2025
7pm ET (NYC time)
Free! RSVP with email at checkout
PLEASE NOTE: Video playback of free events is only available to Patreon members. Become a Member HERE.
Ticketholders: A Zoom invite is sent out two hours before the event to the email used at checkout. Please check your spam folder and if not received, email hello@morbidanatomy.org.
Join two music-thanatologists for a rare and resonant evening exploring the deep history and living practice of music at the bedside of the dying. We’ll begin in the hushed cloisters of medieval Cluny, where the Benedictine Order cultivated an exquisite intertwining of ritual, chant, and care for the dying—a tradition steeped in the belief that music could help usher the soul from life to death. In these sacred spaces, melodies were more than art—they were a spiritual technology, tuned to the body and spirit in their final hours.
Fast-forward to today: Music-thanatology has emerged as a modern clinical practice, pairing harp and voice in an intimate, responsive dialogue with the breath, pulse, and needs of those at the end of life. Our presenters—both trained in this rare discipline—will weave together history, personal narratives, and live demonstrations, revealing how the ancient Cluniac sensibility persists in modern hospices and hospital rooms.
This lecture will speak to anyone fascinated by the intersection of death, art, and the body, offering a glimpse into an ancient monastic tradition where music is not performance, but presence; not entertainment, but a final act of care.
Jane Franz is the Executive Director for Accorda Music-Thanatology Institute. A certified music-thanatologist for more than twenty years. She served as lead music-thanatologist for PeaceHealth Medical Centers and Hospices in Eugene, Springfield, and Florence, Oregon. Jane was the co-founder and director of the Music-Thanatology Training Program through Lane Community College, in Portland, OR, where she also served as a faculty member from 2007-2015. In 2015, with Sandra LaForge, Jane co-authored From Behind the Harp: Music in End of Life Care. Her music appears on two albums, Loom of Love (2005) and From the Deep Earth (2007), She currently resides in Henderson, NV.
Kate Davis is a lifelong musician, songwriter, and current Music-Thanatologist at Providence St. Vincent. She grew up in West Linn, Oregon, before spending 15 years in NYC, where she attended the Manhattan School of Music and freelanced as a bassist and singer. Last year, she returned to Portland to study at the Accorda Music-Thanatology Institute, and in doing so, returned home to her formative and meaningful roots in the PNW.
Monday, October 27, 2025
7pm ET (NYC time)
Free! RSVP with email at checkout
PLEASE NOTE: Video playback of free events is only available to Patreon members. Become a Member HERE.
Ticketholders: A Zoom invite is sent out two hours before the event to the email used at checkout. Please check your spam folder and if not received, email hello@morbidanatomy.org.
Join two music-thanatologists for a rare and resonant evening exploring the deep history and living practice of music at the bedside of the dying. We’ll begin in the hushed cloisters of medieval Cluny, where the Benedictine Order cultivated an exquisite intertwining of ritual, chant, and care for the dying—a tradition steeped in the belief that music could help usher the soul from life to death. In these sacred spaces, melodies were more than art—they were a spiritual technology, tuned to the body and spirit in their final hours.
Fast-forward to today: Music-thanatology has emerged as a modern clinical practice, pairing harp and voice in an intimate, responsive dialogue with the breath, pulse, and needs of those at the end of life. Our presenters—both trained in this rare discipline—will weave together history, personal narratives, and live demonstrations, revealing how the ancient Cluniac sensibility persists in modern hospices and hospital rooms.
This lecture will speak to anyone fascinated by the intersection of death, art, and the body, offering a glimpse into an ancient monastic tradition where music is not performance, but presence; not entertainment, but a final act of care.
Jane Franz is the Executive Director for Accorda Music-Thanatology Institute. A certified music-thanatologist for more than twenty years. She served as lead music-thanatologist for PeaceHealth Medical Centers and Hospices in Eugene, Springfield, and Florence, Oregon. Jane was the co-founder and director of the Music-Thanatology Training Program through Lane Community College, in Portland, OR, where she also served as a faculty member from 2007-2015. In 2015, with Sandra LaForge, Jane co-authored From Behind the Harp: Music in End of Life Care. Her music appears on two albums, Loom of Love (2005) and From the Deep Earth (2007), She currently resides in Henderson, NV.
Kate Davis is a lifelong musician, songwriter, and current Music-Thanatologist at Providence St. Vincent. She grew up in West Linn, Oregon, before spending 15 years in NYC, where she attended the Manhattan School of Music and freelanced as a bassist and singer. Last year, she returned to Portland to study at the Accorda Music-Thanatology Institute, and in doing so, returned home to her formative and meaningful roots in the PNW.