Music Is Medicine

Yes, yes, yes, and yes. In 2006 I had a head injury. A huge PA speaker that had steadily vibrated over the years from the very loud music that came through it, slowly moved on the shelf it where it was perched, until it fell from about 3 feet above my head, where I happened to be dancing that night. It swung from the cable and slammed me in my right temple. By some miracle and a lot of healing over the following months (sound as well as other modalities), I recovered from the injury. That’s not the point of this story. There was a particularly exciting moment for me about a week after the injury when I got an MRI and saw the image of my brain. My brain! It felt like when Peter Pan saw his shadow- “My shadow! My very own shadow!” Really quite thrilling.

11 months later I was looking through the Arts & Leisure section of the New York Times and, lo and behold, there was a full page image of various brain scans taken while people were listening to music and an article about the researcher, Daniel Levitin. It grabbed me partly because I had not so long ago seen a scan of my own brain after a quite serious injury, and still more so because of the particular topic which is of course my passion! He had just published a book called This Is Your Brain On Music which, to this day, remains one of my favorite books on the effects of music on the brain. Levitin is a musician himself and had a career as a music producer, where he developed a fascination with how certain people (in this case, music producers) are able to discern extremely fine gradations of sound and music. That was the beginning. Click here to read the full article. The picture at the top of the page is the original copy which I still have in my files.

Long story short and fast forward, I just found out today that this year he has published a new book- I Heard There Was A Secret Chord. I was excited and delighted and ended up listening to about 3 hours worth of videos with him and ordered the book for myself and as a Christmas present for a loved one. Here is a wonderful video, so well worth listening to if you are an avid sound and music lover- and possibly a frequency nerd as well! Carlos Reyes is extraordinary. When he picked up his violin and started playing his first piece, I was in tears at the first two notes- one of the points that Levitin and Reyes make during their talk that I think just about everyone can relate to- the power of music to profoundly affect the emotional body, sometimes creating gentle waves, sometimes rougher waters, but ultimately bringing us to a resolution.

Tears That Are Unspoken Words

Two years ago my older brother Tim passed away due to Covid. He was 7 years older than me and when we were younger- much younger- he opened me up to a world of great music. We might be at our father’s house in Newport or I might have been up at Tim’s house in Vermont where he lived with a group of friends- a sort of “hippie house”- and I would suddenly hear his voice. “Hey Rosie, come here! You gotta hear this!” He actually never played a single piece of music for me that I didn’t like, in fact generally that I didn’t love. Dave Mason’s album “Alone Together” was one of them- every track on it being excellent. He loved it and I immediately fell in love with it. Since that day, more than 50 years ago, I have listened to it hundreds of times. It is one of my all-time favorite albums. I know every word and every note on that album. (I have gone through two copies of the vinyl- because the first one got so worn out and now have it on CD.)

A few years ago I decided I wanted to learn to play the song “Sad and Deep As You” on my guitar. It’s one of those songs that you can just sit and play and sing over and over and never tire of it. Just a sweet, sad, beautiful song. Four years ago I put everything in storage and left the country for a while. Due to the pandemic I ended up relocating and much of my stuff has stayed in storage. Yesterday I was unpacking a box from a load of stuff I had brought down from RI last week and there was a little pile of papers in the bottom of the box- songs that I had printed out a few years ago, and that song was among them.

I was feeling good, with warm memories, just singing and getting into the sweet groove of the song and suddenly the memory hit me… of Tim turning me on to that album, sitting on the bed with him just completely knocked out by the music- all of the songs, the words, the nuances and that wonderful shared experience… and I was weeping.

And there was the last verse:
Tears that are unspoken words
Tears that are the truth
Tears that tell a story
As sad and deep as you…

So, I sat and cried- wept- and then I started singing it again… and again… and again…

Grateful for memories.
Grateful for the ability to feel deeply.

Distance Is No Object

It’s late but I have a little story I want to share. I have been in Rhode Island for about a week. I wasn’t planning to do any sessions while I was up here because I already have a lot going on, but I had a friend who was in crisis so I agreed to give her a session. We had it scheduled for today but at the last minute, at the end of the day yesterday, it turned out that it wasn’t going to work out. I talked with her on the phone and gave her my best motivational inspirational pep talk, reminding her that she had done a lot of work and had plenty of tools and she just needed to get through one day- today, which meant for her a very stressful court date- and then she could come to the group sound healing session I have scheduled for tomorrow. Once there she could breathe, exhale and release all that she has had going on. I told her that in the meantime I would give her a long distant healing session. Even at the suggestion I could feel her appreciation and relief.

I decided to do it this morning when I woke up a little before 7. I texted her at precisely 6:57 and told her I was about to play one of my sound journeys and send her long distant healing. I attached the sound journey to the text via Dropbox and told her that whenever she had the chance, preferably this morning, she should simply relax and listen to the sound journey and take it in. I lay in bed for a full hour giving myself a treatment with the Radiance Technique, all the while connecting with her energy and very consciously sending healing to her as well. At 9:45 I received this message from her: “Thank you so much. I woke at 7am with lots of anxiety, and strangely fell back asleep until 8:30… then saw your message which now makes sense why I likely dozed off… and then listened to the recording. My body feels relaxed, both were well received and I thank you so very much. Amazing, truly amazing.” I replied that I am still always blown away by how well this stuff works! She said, “Oh my goodness, me too! My first experience like this and I’m a believer, thank you so much Rosie.”

Speaking of breathing, here is a sweet song by an old and dear friend, LeRoy White, who passed away a little over 3 years ago. He was beloved by many and lived his life to uplift others with his music and incredible generosity of spirit.

Change Your Brain (or, Breathe and Smile)

This is an excerpt from a newsletter I sent out earlier today. I felt that it was worth sharing here as well.

One of the things I am always so grateful for is that I can walk through my house any time of day and pick up a flute, play a gong, a singing bowl or whatever other instrument calls to me in the moment. I always feel like, when a particular instrument catches my eye, it is sending me a message to pick it up and play. (In fact, that's basically how I move through my sound journeys- the instruments tell me which ones to play. They either catch my eye or I hear the sound before I actually begin to play it.)

It only takes a moment to change your state- sometimes just a single note or an extended tone is enough. Maybe you want to think about how you can enhance your sonic environment. Hang a bell on a door or a chime outside your window. You might already have instruments that you have never thought about as "healing"- but, as my former partner Henry said years ago, "Making any sound with a loving intention will produce a healing effect." Perhaps you have an instrument that you have forgotten about or take for granted- it has become a fixture in the corner or on the wall. Pick up that guitar or the old saxophone collecting dust in the closet! And when you pick it up, play it nice and slow. Play a long tone. And listen... listen... listen... And then play another long slow tone... Listen... Breathe... Repeat...

Or HUM!!! Yes. HUM!!! Vibrate your cells from the inside out. Science has shown how the simple act of humming can help with stress levels, sleep and blood pressure as well increasing lymphatic circulation and melatonin production- just to name a few of the benefits- and if you have a voice, you can HUMMMM!

I was actually just reading yesterday that singing is one of the only activities that activates both hemispheres of the brain at the same time. It releases endorphins and oxytocin and can influence memory and brain function. In short- it's good for you!!! Music is brain food, and like all food, it is individual. Not everyone likes the same thing. Notice what sounds excite you, calm you, ground you, make you smile. Take five minutes out of your busy day to listen- just listen. If a sound is irritating you, see what happens when you breathe into it- or hum along with it. Play with it. Become curious about it. What happens if you let go of your resistance and breathe? As my dear friend LeRoy White used to sing, "Breathe and smile."

The Kindness of Friends (You Gotta Have 'Em!)

At this moment I am sitting in my chiropractor’s office in Murphy, North Carolina, feeling grateful for kind friends. Last fall I came in here one day with my back talking to me in a not very happy tone. As my chiropractor was questioning as to what might be aggravating it, I told her that I had been spending lots of hours sitting at my computer. It takes me a really long time to get things done on it at home because we have an insanely slow signal. She then offered, out of the blue, to let me come in and work out of her back office where they have high speed internet. Kind people- I have always enjoyed and appreciated coming here but I really feel like now they have become my friends.

Hmmm…I had no idea where this was going to go when I started writing a few minutes ago… but ah, yes… friends! Kindness… understanding… empathy… a listening heart… a hand to hold… someone to share a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, a good book… and laughter… always laughter…

Here are a few of my favorite songs about friendship. I remember the first time I heard Bette Midler’s song, “Friends”. I was at my brother Tim’s house in Vermont, probably about 14, maybe 15 years old, and some young hippie girl- no idea who she was- came in the house, sat down at the piano and launched into that song. I didn’t know who had written it or where it came from but it was wonderful and exquisite and exuberant and brought tears to my eyes… tears of joy- I think mixed with some longing for that wonderful energy of close friends. It wasn’t for a few months after that before I heard the actual album “The Divine Miss M” and was blown away by it and so happy to be able to listen to that wonderful song again, and again and again!

And of course, I have so many wonderful memories of Carole King’s song “You’ve Got a Friend” which was practically an anthem for my good friends and me as teeenagers in boarding school. It never gets old.

Enjoy!!!

Gardening and Grooving

It’s been a very intense year so far. Every day i want to write and I have had some frustration with not being able to post new pictures on my computer. Long story- not interesting to anyone, I’m sure! So we’ll just glide right past that. Update- problem solved

So where am I right now? Here’s a quick update. I fell in love.*

And now it’s September and I fell out of love. Okay, back to what I was writing two months ago.

My son Moose and his wife Jenny had twins- Ruby and Wren- on December 26. They came home from the hospital at the end of January a couple of days before their official due date of 2.22.22.

I drove back and forth to Rhode Island and Maine 3 times between October and December… and then a 4th time in April for my brother Tim’s funeral after he died from Covid.

Tim on the far right, 1972, with our younger brother Peter at the helm (age 15 at the time and youngest crew member) during transatlantic to Kiel, Germany for Operation Sail, aboard the Black Pearl.

A week after Tim’s funeral I flew out to Minneapolis to meet my granddaughters, Ruby and Wren, in the sweet pink baby flesh! They were 3 months old and it was the perfect balm after losing my brother- not that it could make up for it, but it certainly softened things a lot and nurtured my soul.

Oh, did I mention I had an appendectomy? February 22, the same night my brother Tim was put on a ventilator. Ugh, not a good night. The night before I was probably the sickest and most scared I have ever been in my adult life, vomiting violently to the point I thought I was actually going to suffocate as I was unable at times to even get a breath. it was horrible. Anyway, I got through it and felt a thousand times better after the offending organ was removed! But an emotionally challenging time as Tim was also clearly not recovering from Covid the way it was anticipated.

Next? May rolled around and I went to Florida to do 3 Healing Sound Journeys- the first public events I had done since the start of the pandemic! I have LOTS more to say about that trip and the things I learned about my work, all (or most) of which I am saving for another post. I will post a groovy picture here though!

Instruments set up for a Healing Sound Journey at the Temple of The Living God in St. Petersburg, FL.

And then it was June- which is when I started this post! A trip to Haris Lender’s Yurtananda, her very groovy retreat in the hills of Virginia down the road from Swami Satchitananda’s ashram in Yogaville. She had just completed a beautiful outdoor music stage and invited me up to do a Healing Sound Journey outside in the woods with the birds and the bees and some trees- and a few people too! She was unquestionably the hostess with the mostess and it was a wonderful time!

For those of you who are on Facebook, here is a link to a short video that Haris took. Unfortunately there is no other access to it. To watch video click here.

And that’s all for now- almost! I got back home and was able to do a bit of gardening- put in a sweet little herb garden… planted 3 kinds of thyme, rosemary, lavender, parsley, echinacea, mint, catnip, lemon balm, lamb’s ears, kalanchoe and a gorgeous orange canna.

I also managed to find time for a bit of artistic expression (besides cooking, music, sound healing and gardening) and I did this collage on canvas which I think is my favorite to date. So, I’ve caught you up to June with many gaps but I’ll leave you with this image. More to come.

I AM

I gave myself a vibroacoustic sound treatment today, wanting to relieve my mind and emotional body a bit and continue the healing from my recent appendectomy using Richway’s BioAcoustic Mat together with the Amethyst BioMat, a therapeutic far-infrared heating pad. Mostly I was feeling sad and worried about my brother who is in critical condition with Covid and deeply concerned for his family. I turned up the sound and turned up the heat! I played the album “A Universe to Come” by Tulku, produced by the late great Jim Wilson. All of his work lends itself really well to vibroacoustic therapy.

i dropped in fast and deep. Images came and went before I had to a chance to grasp them. The only thing I distinctly remember was the sense at a certain point that the encumbrances of my physical body had dropped away and my energetic body felt fluid and expanded. it felt like it was dancing, but not like the physical body dancing- more like waves on the ocean, being pushed by the wind and the ocean currents- but in this case by the frequencies, by the rhythms and tones of the music.

When the music was over I lay there for a long time- maybe another half hour. My mind was very still. I got up feeling quiet inside. This is the last track on the CD. It is beautiful and profound.

Feelin' Good

It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life- and it’s a new year! And I AM feelin’ good!

So much to celebrate, so much to be grateful for.

My new year always starts off on January 9. January 8 is my birthday and, for me, the culmination of the holiday season. My final sweet treat- always the best carrot cake I can find- which for the past two years has been my own- far healthier than whatever I can get “out there” and absolutely killer! This year I didn’t have my cake until January 10th because my actual birthday was so full. and I didn’t have time to bake it until the next evening- by which time it was too late to eat it! On the day of, I did a sound journey via Zoom which was attended by about 35 people- what a wonderful way to celebrate! Not my plan- it was hosted by my friend Rose Russo who runs a yoga group for cancer survivors. It just “happened” to land on my birthday. Friends from near and far- even one whom I had not seen since I was 17! What a treat- so wonderful.

Meanwhile I AM doing my best to get down to business, to think about what I want to create and what I want to regenerate in this bright new year. My intention is to set reasonable goals- enlightenment can wait… but occasionally withdrawing my attention from the objects of my experience and relaxing gently into the awareness of I AM no longer seems impossible.

I am reading Rupert Spira’s book Being Myself and feel like I am beginning to understand (which reminds me of another song). A water molecule cannot separate itself from the water and look at the ocean. It can only relax into the experience of being the ocean. It can look at the little fishes and the big fishes and the coral and the plankton and the sunlight coming through the water and all of the wonders that present themselves but it is one with the water. It cannot actually look back at its Self- it can only rest in the fullness of the experience of Being. And so it is.

I am posting another video here- the Moody Blues Melancholy Man- which sounds like it might be gloomy - but in fact I feel like it is so full of hope. This is a great live version of the song. I believe it was from a concert on the Isle of Wight.
“All the world astounds me and I think I understand
That we’re going to keep growing, wait and see.”

Outsider Art and Music- Adolf Wölfli

“Outsider art, synonymous until the 1980s with art brut, any work of art produced by an untrained idiosyncratic artist who is typically unconnected to the conventional art world—not by choice but by circumstance. The “classic” figures of outsider art were socially or culturally marginal figures. They were usually undereducated; they almost invariably embraced unconventional views of the world, sometimes alien to the prevailing dominant culture; and many had been diagnosed as mentally ill. These people nevertheless produced—out of adversity and with no eye on fame or fortune—substantial high-quality artistic oeuvres.” ~www.britannica.com~

I have spent most of the day reading about and poring over the life and work of Adolf Wölfli (1864-1930)- an artist who just came to my attention this morning. Initially it was the musical notation embedded in the artwork that grabbed me- the particular image that I first saw was so intricate that I thought it must be a fresco on the ceiling of a huge building. No, he would not have had access to a ceiling as it turns out- just paper and colored pencils. He was so prolific that by the time of his death the volumes filled with his autobiographical writings and artwork stacked one atop the other stood almost 6 feet high.

My friend who had posted the original drawing that had so enthralled me did not know the location of the particular piece of art and thus began my journey. I was soon in tears seeing the genius come to life- his early life was plagued by misery with the death of his parents, followed by abuse in foster homes, time spent in prison as he grew more violent and ultimately the last half of his life spent in an institution.

How could it be that I had never seen his work? In his lifetime, the last 35 of which were spent in a mental asylum as a patient suffering from schizophrenia and severe hallucinations, he composed an imaginary autobiography of over 25,000 pages of art, poetry and musical notation in which he is the sole traveler, transforming a childhood of misery into one of magic and adventure.

The musical notation in his artwork initially appeared to be decorative but was in fact playable. Apparently he would sometimes play it himself with a paper trumpet he had made. You can listen here to his musical cryptograms analyzed and played on the violin by Baudouin de Jaer. They are lyrical, mysterious and beautiful: Analysis of the Musical Cryptograms of Adolf Wölfli.

I am also posting a fascinating article of a summary of the life of Adolf Wölfli with many more pictures of his art included. Adolf Wölfli by Paul Greer, originally posted on March 25, 2014.

Die Skt-Wandanna-Kathedrale in Band-Wand, 1910

Musiknotation, 1930

General View of the Island Neveranger, 1911

Ah, synchronicity is a beautiful thing! My friend Keith Bernard, who posted the original picture this morning that led me down this path of discovery, just sent me the photo as I was about to publish this page!

Circumscribe… (unable to find a date for this work)

Are You Awake?

Hello my friends. Today is Day 9 of my Restorative Retreat. I am so happy and grateful that I can stay here for a while and not feel like I have to get up and go anywhere else for the time being. When it feels right and I feel ready and well rested I will take a ride up to RI and get some more of my stuff out of storage but I am not making a plan other than to pay attention and follow my guidance on that.

I have been absorbed in sound and music in various forms. I’ve spent quite a bit of time practicing the piano and playing the guitar, trying to break out and explore new possibilities rather than just sticking with what I know- which Is easy to do on the piano because I don’t know much at all other than the notes and basic scales. I do understand the basics of creating chords also so I have a little bit of very basic foundational material to work with.

… And… some time has elapsed since I wrote the above- I am now on day 13 of my stay-at-home retreat! I have completed a painting (see below!), created several very simple short riffs on the piano, painted a couple of stools for the breakfast bar in my kitchen, made homemade pizza (and had Mahesh & Mukta over to help me eat them), explored double drop D tuning on the guitar, taken a two-hour online yoga class on the day of the most recent full moon and been working on whitening the bones of a turtle skeleton and shell found down by the pond on the property where I live. I’ve also made a few short meditation videos intended basically to help my friends end their evening on a good note. I spent hours one day going through pictures from the Sound Body Wholistic Health Center- my old sound healing center in St. Pete- just to pick out a new cover photo for the Facebook page for the center. And I’ve watched a whole bunch of episodes of “Doctor, Doctor” on Amazon Prime- AKA “The Heart Guy”!

I have several plants that Mahesh and Mukta gave me waiting to be planted. Cannas and kalanchoe… and a rosemary plant that I bought at the market. My yard is very drab. Needs some new life for sure. It’s small but there’s plenty of room for some herbs and flowers to brighten things up. The truth is I’ve been nervous about digging around too much in the yard because the one day I did in the spring I was introduced to chiggers- not fun!

Last night before bed I had a teaspoon of honey with cannabis extract in it. It is supposed to help with sleep. It didn’t- in fact it had the opposite effect. I was up til somewhere around 5 a.m. At a certain point it occurred to me that perhaps I should focus on “waking up” rather than going to sleep. I am fascinated by my dream state… isn’t my “waking state” equally as important, if not more so? And what does it mean to be awake? So I picked up Francis Lucille’s book, The Perfume of Silence.

I have only just started it but I can pretty comfortably say that it is on the nature of consciousness and non-dual reality. In response to a question in the beginning of the book he uses the sound of birds and ambient outdoor sounds as a reference point. He says, “Ask yourself, ‘Where do they appear?’ If the answer is that the bird is singing 50 feet from here, see that this is not actually your experience, that it is a concept. The actual experience of the sound is happening at a zero distance from you, not 50 feet away. It is not happening there but rather here, always. Everything is always happening here and now.”

Immediately I tuned into the sound of the crickets “outside” and suddenly felt that i was floating in a sea of consciousness. Everything that “seems” to be happening to me and around me is happening within the consciousness of I AM. I picked up my journal long enough to write “There is no separation between ‘I’ and my experience of the world around me- around the body I seem to inhabit. I am in fact inhabiting everything I seem to come into contact with.” And then drifted back out into the sea of consciousness…

Input vs Output (Too Much Information!)

Oh dear- where have I been? Clearly not here. Not for lack of wanting to be here and post- literally every day I think of it and of all the things I want to share… But lord how fast the day gets away from me! Something hit me between last night and this morning having to do with the awareness of what happens when I get on the computer even with the best of intentions. I plan to write- a blog post, an email, a letter, a class description, whatever- but I get so quickly distracted by all the information coming at me that I lose focus almost immediately. And what I am realizing is that currently the information I am taking in is totally overwhelming that which I am putting out. I am drowning in information! I don’t think it is very different than the concept of “calories in, calories out.” If you want to lose weight you need to expend at least as many calories as you are taking in. If I want to be productive I have to limit the amount of information I am taking in and balance it with an output of energy and creativity.

There are other things I want to do with my day as well in terms of creativity- writing, painting, making jewelry- and always the everpresent sound work. I have instruments I love to play and practice including (but not limited to!) harmonium, banjo, guitar, and all of my sound journey instruments- Himalayan bowls, gongs, etc. I have also been in the midst of figuring out how to translate some of my work to Zoom which has been an interesting challenge that I think I have almost figured out. I just need to do a few more tests.

I have just become a member of a new holistic wellness group online that I am excited about and which looks like it can lead to some great possibilities for expanding my reach. I am still excited about the new opportunities and awarenesses that have come about due to Covid, for example teaching classes online- something I had never considered until very recently. It has led to a new level of creative thinking that I feel is a real gift among the challenges that have been put before us all in so many ways. I recently bought several mics, a mixer and two new sets of headphones- one wired and one wireless- which is a whole new level of working with technology for me. I am looking forward to seeing what comes out of all this!

I had the thought of The Police song “Too Much Information” from their album Ghost In The Machine in my mind but when I revisited it the original version it felt way too abrasive (maybe it’s just too early in the morning). Then I found this great live version which starts off with “Lazarus Heart” and then morphs into “Too Much Information”- well done!

SMiLE!

This morning someone sent me a wonderful song (Vege-tables) by Brian Wilson which led right into this incredible brilliant joyful and heartwarming full live performance of his 2004 album release, SMiLE (begun in 1967). I had no intention of watching a music video first thing in the morning but with the opening notes I was hooked. I went into my kitchen, turned my Bose Bluetooth speaker up high, cleaned my kitchen and danced and sang- and decided I should start every day dancing! But seriously, this is brilliant- complex beautiful arrangements that could only come from the musical genius of Brian Wilson. Turn up your speakers and SMiLE!

Ring The Bells

Today is a great day in America. We can breathe again. No words are needed. I offer you this.

Time and Time Again

The first thing I thought about this morning was time. Again! Specifically more songs about time. I thought I would post them right away and get my blog out of the way first thing. But before I got to them this beautiful ancient healing mantra came up on my Facebook feed. Years ago my Sanskrit teacher, the late and beloved Swami Shivananda- affectionately known to his students as Swami Bob- told me that it is the oldest healing mantra on the planet. I decided to check it out as I was curious how they chanted it, whether it was melodic or more straightforward traditional chanting.

It turned out it is beautifully sung by Shankar Sahney in responsive form and I was pulled right in. For the next 45 minutes I chanted along with it. It did wonders for me on so many levels including opening up my voice. By the end, all the cells in my body were vibrating and felt somehow perfectly aligned as if I had had a cellular repatterning. When I got up I felt clear, balanced and grounded.

When I finally got to my blog the webpage was totally uncooperative so I’m just getting to it now! Enjoy the music.