Healing Sound
I have worked for many years on the generation of healing sound sonic environments based on meditation, acoustics, tonings and esoteric anatomy. I studied music and meditation in India, music composition, acoustics, computer and electronic technology at the University of Cincinnati. I wrote 3 Symphonies and dozens of electronic music compositions.
Now (2013) I'm returning to this field to create Healing Sound with the new more powerful analog modular synthesizer systems. Combined with computers to store the setting and patches and to provide control voltages for the exact creation and control of the sound parameters, we can easily create powerful healing sound tuned for an individual with the newest technology creating possibilities that were not available in the past.
I am creating CD's for meditation, sleep and healing. I am working with Dr. Paul Dugliss (see the bio information below) and my wife Troi (a nurse working with healing touch) on creating sound environments that are created and tuned for each individual. The basic structure is a huge, totally harmonic electronic mantra-like, chant-like, droning chorus built on the natural overtone series .. each partial (overtone) is in constant modulation (amplitude) creating dynamic, constantly changing, vowel-like "tonings" that relax and revitalize the listener, reinforcing and re-harmonizing their internal subtle bodies. According to Eastern medicine and metaphysics, certain pitches , harmonies and sound transformations (mutations) of meditatively created musical textures can resonate with the natural body/psyche and allow the soul to tune into and resonate with the source of all healing energy within. (Non-harmonic tones are also useful in certain contexts.)
In our healing sound environments there are at least 12 resonating (electronic) strings (analogous to the sympathetic strings on the Tambura and Sitar) that drone, sparkle and twinkle in the background creating a very rich, beautiful fabric of background sound. As the melodies play over them, various notes are reinforced and resonate in reaction to frequencies that are harmonious with each. Sometimes it give the effects of shimmering echoing pitches generated as the melody passes through their "sub-harmonic" root pitches. Some of these rich timbres are further sampled and then used as the fundamental drone and/or melodic timbres that then trigger even richer harmonic overtones.
The sound is quadraphonic, (surround-sound) and multiple voices of the music move independently around the sound environment creating circles and lines (sound streaks like meteorites) surrounding the listener. The intent is that the mind is captivated by the delicately vibrating, pulsing and sensuous sounds so that the attention becomes focused and relaxed... a sonic massage of sorts. In the attentive and relaxed state, one becomes aware of very subtle interplays between the voices and the background architecture draws melodies and harmonies in patterns like a mandala.
Mandala Music
This sand mandala is a visual example of what the music is painting sonically:
The sound mandala is "drawn" with harmonies and musical patterns a section at a time; others layers are added until the entire sound environment is filled with rotating & shifting patterns.
In the next section of these compositions another entire sound mandala is created in the background (like the next image) and slowly the present sound morphs into the next mandala .. image the next image rotating in multiple circles and mutating in color ...
a... then a 3rd entire mandala of sound is created and the 2 mandalas crossfade like galaxies passing through each other...
Here I use these
visual mandalas to try to convey what I’m creating in music. Image each
mandala in sound … with the various rings within each rotating at
different speeds and directions and also moving in 3D (forward and back
and rotating)…. Then a new sound mandala (the next image) is
created and emerges and the two mandalas merge as the 2nd passes through
(like galaxies) and eventually only the 2nd remains in our hearing with
tonal colors also mutating. Then it happens again with a 3rd mandala .
Perhaps the 4th mandala is created from parts of the other mandalas to
create entirely new patterns .. like in meditation …
The Buchla 200e synthesizer is the main synthesizer.
I will also develop some healing sound equipment .. The first is a surround sound set of complex waveform generators that generate very deep , very rich timbrally and harmonically .... the exact frequency relations between the oscillators is controlled by electronic feedback from the listener that fine tunes the frequencies for the maximum relaxation of the listener.
In other words, a small computer monitors the effect of the sound on the listener, and changes (very gradually) the pitches for the best response (to maximize both relaxation & alertness ).
Music toning can be tuned for an individual's needs, for specific organs or for specific goals. For healing, sound works to transform the negative energy centered in the psyche or physical organs and to transform it into healing energies. Eastern medicine teaches that various organs respond to certain frequencies that can be used for healing.
Dr. Paul Dugliss, M.D.
Practices Internal Medicine and Ayurvedic Medicine across the country. He is also trained an acupuncturist and practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine. The former director of Oakwood Healthcare System’s Complementary & Alternative Medicine Center in Westland, MI, he began studying Ayurvedic Medicine in the mid-1980s. He received training in Ayurveda in the United States and Europe. Dr. Dugliss has authored several books: Ayurveda — The Power to Heal, Capturing the Bliss: Ayurveda & the Yoga of Emotions, The Myth of Cholesterol, Enlightened Nutrition and Yoga & Ayurveda. He directs the New World Ayurveda Program, a training program designed to train Ayurvedic health educators and clinicians throughout the United States. In conjunction with several psychologists and therapists, he is also teaching holistic mental health care through Ayurvedic Counseling.
Electronic Music Synthesis
These systems allow the creation of any sound, can duplicate acoustic sounds and create an infinite number of new sounds impossible to create with convention instruments. The composer has total control over every harmonic (component) of each sound and can build "complex" tones of beauty and depth. The fundamental timbres are very rich harmonically and very dynamic , very lively , and are combined creating unique sounds and a new type of healing music. Some of these sounds have been described as like "100 Tibetan monks chanting", an orchestra of "Martian Mandolins", the sound of a living mandala, Angelic songs and the OM of Creation.
Buchla Modular Synthesizer
selected system components
Mark Verbos Harmonic Oscillator .. allows control of the amplitude of each harmonic ... (essentially a total control of the timbre of a single complex pitch)
Buchla Complex Waveform Generator .. best sounding , musical , waveform generator ... core of the Buchla 200e systems.
.. Buchla Spectral Processor
Buchla System Interface
studio
