Music as a path to Resonance and Reception

As with many other "concepts" we are accustomed to the idea or "feeling" that we know what "music" is. As with many such "concepts" the truth is that we never have truly delved into the question or even attempted to answer it. We just assumed that we knew at some point when we were children and kept going in that direction, without ever looking back. Maybe it's time to look back.

At its most general we could look at "music" as "structured sound" or "sonic architecture" travelling through a pathway that moves in only one direction (at least from our perspective): TIME. Music starts and ends, music repeats, music grows and fades. All of this happens in the sequential experience of time. Within this sequential experience, the sonic structures we perceive as music or simply rhythm can affect us and touch us in very intimate and transcending ways. It is this effect that is at the heart of our experience of music and sound.

When we listen to music as a group, the whole group slowly fades into one mind through the common experience of beat, rhythm and melody. Depending on individual sensitivities and perception, this unifying process can take a long time or it can be almost instantaneous. But in any case, the music works as a force of unification on the human group, whether consciously or unconsciously. We will use this knowledge in a very conscious way, first to simply unify the separate units of "I" that pervade the group. Later we will use particular structures and moods to invoke a single new "I" which will take over the group for spaces of time. This new large "I" is the shaman or angel and each of its faces has a particular key that will allow it to come forth. But this will come later. We will start by simply experimenting with music as individuals and learn to use it and perceive it in new ways.

As individuals, our first experiments with music will involve allowing the sounds, beats, harmonies and melodies to flow into us freely and to permit ourselves to respond subtly, internally and "beyond mind". A stumbling block in this process will be our general tendency to constantly "talk to ourselves". Through various exercises we will attempt to turn this block on its head and make it a tool.  The quiet voice within us that constantly chatters away about any and all subjects will become our private companion in listening voyages. Once we can listen together, the very experience of listening will change and previously forbidden territory will open up into rainbow colored explosions of time.

Experiment:

1. Put the First Voyage disc on your CD player.  For this Experiment, play on loudspeakers, not on headphones.
2. Allow the sounds to fill the room, stand in the middle of the room and witness how the vibrations create a specific and special chamber around you.   Notice that the music is filling up the room as liquid fills up a receptacle, or energy fills up a dynamo. 
3. Ask yourself “what organ am I using to perceive this chamber?”  Perhaps is one of your five senses, perhaps is your overall body, perhaps is one of your charkas, or perhaps is no organ you’ve ever noticed before.  Regardless, ask yourself the question.  If the question has no immediate answer, don’t worry.  Just ponder it.
4. Now, move the organ of perception throughout some of your known senses.  Try to perceive the energy filling up and moving inside the chamber with your eyes, after doing that for a while, try to perceive with your ears, then your sense of smell, then the tip of your fingers.
5. If you like, you can also try to use other organs to sense the energy.
6. Finally, interact with the energy.  Do this by touching it with the tips of your fingers, allow it to slide through your fingers, and caress it with the palms of your hands.  Play with it for a while, you can move around the room a bit, or stand firm on the same place.  Move your arms around, and touch the energy.  Play with it.  Move it around.  Mix it up.  Stir.  Have fun.

Experiment 2

1. Stand up straight in a quiet room or a quiet lonely area of a forest.
2. Take a deep breath. As you inhale concentrate on the word "Something"
3. As soon as you stop inhaling, exhale slowly and concentrate on the word "Nothing".
4. Repeat this cycle consistently. Use the same amount of time to inhale and to exhale and continue to focus on the two words.
5. Feel each cycle as a beat. Let the beat become stronger, more insistent, louder.  The word "something" becomes deeper and heavier. The word "nothing" becomes lighter and almost invisible. 
   Don't allow the beat to slow down or speed up. If you feel it doing either one, slowly move it back to the initial speed.
6. After a few minutes, stop the cycles and rest, but continue to hear the beat in your head.

Experiment 3 : 4 beats

To do this Experiment as well as others, you will need a metronome. You can get one for less than $20 at any local music store.

1. Set the metronome at a very slow comfortable pace (60bpms or so).
2. Stand in the center of a quiet room. Face East.
3. Take a few deep breaths.
4. Say the word "EAST" as you face east and give yourself to the feeling/sensation that comes from that direction.
5. Allow 4 beats to go by. At the 4th beat turn to the south.
6. Say the word "SOUTH" as you face south and give yourself to the feeling/sensation that comes from that direction.
7. Allow 4 beats to go by. At the 4th beat turn to the west.
8. Say the word "WEST" as you face west and give yourself to the feeling/sensation that comes from that direction.
9. Allow 4 beats to go by. At the 4th beat turn to the north.
10. Say the word "NORTH" as you face north and give yourself to the feeling/sensation that comes from that direction.
11. Repeat the whole cycle for about 15 minutes. Feel the 4 beats that you stay on each direction as one cycle and the larger cycle of 4 directions as a second all encompassing cycle.

As you try this Experiment, allow the impressions to come in whatever manner they come.  You might get impressions of colors, sounds, visions, textures, smells, thoughts, ideas, people, or cognitions.  The manner in which the quadrants appear to you could be different each time, or they might appear in the same manner for a while.  Once you do this Experiment for a few times, try to keep a temporary record of the manifestations and how they change.  If you do this with other people, compare notes at the end.  For this Experiment, "taking notes" can be either in the form of writing, drawing, painting, sculpting, etc.

Experiment 4: 4 Beats Part 2

1. Sit at a piano, guitar or any other kind of instrument. It doesn't matter if you can play this instrument or not, as long as you can make some kind of sound with it.

2. Set your metronome at about 60 beats per minute. Set your timer for 10 minutes.

3. Now extend your hands over the instrument and start to count the beats in your mind.

4. Each 4 beats, make some sound with the instrument. It can be a single note, it can be a chord, it can be any kind of sound you can make with the instrument. If you can do this with your eyes closed, even better!

5. Keep going for the 10 minutes until your timer sounds.

Remember, you are not doing a performance! You don't need to sound "good" or in any way conform to your or anyone else's idea of what is "good" music. Simply make a sound every 4 beats. Lose yourself in the process. Let your hands guide you.

The sounds you make also don't have to start abruptly right as the metronome sounds. You can allow them to flow around the beat of the metronome, sliding in or sliding out, as long as you make one sound per beat.

Duo Experiment: Sound Bridge

1. If this is a large group, divide into pairs. Otherwise find one other person interested in doing these experiments and try this with them.

2. Sit opposite each other, but facing away. Set the timer for 15 minutes. Agree before starting the timer on who will begin the experiment.

3. Start the timer.

4. The one who starts should evoke a strong emotion, through memory or inner emotional posture alone. Once the emotion is there, make a sound that communicates this emotion.

5. Keep making it as your partner begins to imitate and resonate with the sound you are making.

6. Slowly fade your own sound as the sound gets taken over by your partner.

7. The partner now, while mantaining the sound going, evokes a variation of this emotion and changes the sound accordingly.

8. As the sound changes, the first one responds and resonates.

9. Keep on alternating roles, while maintaining an ongoing stream of sound, until the timer sounds.

10. Take several deep breaths and stay in complete silence for at least 10 minutes.

Music as structured frequency, harmonization and resonance, music as a way to make different human machines operate as one for short periods of time

[ How Does A Radio Pick Up a Signal? ] [ Gods and Humans in Greek Myths ] [ Music as a Path to Resonance and Reception ] [ Posession and Santeria ]