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Rich intercultural music engagement (RIME) is an embodied form of engagement whereby individuals immerse themselves in foreign musical practice, for example, by learning a traditional instrument from that culture. The present investigation evaluated whether RIME with Chinese or Middle Eastern music can nurture intercultural understanding. White Australian participants were randomly assigned to one of two plucked-string groups: Chinese pipa ( n = 29) or Middle Eastern oud ( n = 29). Before and after the RIME intervention, participants completed measures of ethnocultural empathy, tolerance, social connectedness, explicit and implicit attitudes towards ethnocultural groups, and open-ended questions about their experience. Following RIME, White Australian participants reported a significant increase in ethnocultural empathy, tolerance, feelings of social connection, and improved explicit and implicit attitudes towards Chinese and Middle Eastern people. However, these benefits differed between groups. Participants who learned Chinese pipa reported reduced bias and increased social connectedness towards Chinese people, but not towards Middle Eastern people. Conversely, participants who learned Middle Eastern oud reported a significant increase in social connectedness towards Middle Eastern people, but not towards Chinese people. This is the first experimental evidence that participatory RIME is an effective tool for understanding a culture other than one's own, with the added potential to reduce cultural bias.

Social isolation and loneliness are serious public health concerns. Music engagement can strengthen social connections and reduce loneliness in some contexts, although how this occurs is not well understood; research suggests that music's capacity to manipulate perceptions of time and space is relevant. This study adopted a qualitative perspective to examine how music engagement shaped the experiences of residents of Victoria, Australia, during conditions of restricted social contact during the lockdowns of 2020. Semi-structured interviews explored participants' lived musical experiences while giving focus to perceptions of time and space (e.g., how music helped restructure home and workspaces in response to lockdown regulations, or punctuate time where older routines were no longer viable). Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of the interview transcripts identified five themes representing the key findings: (1) a super-ordinate theme of perceived control, which comprises four themes: (2) dynamic connection; (3) identity; (4) mobility; (5) presence. Each theme describes one generalised aspect of the way music engagement shaped participants' perceptions of time and space during lockdown and supported their processes of adaptation to and coping with increased social isolation. The authors argue that these findings may inform the way music can be used to address loneliness in everyday life.