THE ROSETTA STONE OF MUSIC

From our archives to your heart

THE ROSETTA STONE OF MUSIC

New Discoveries in Music Healing

Like Jonathan Goldman, Anugama, and other explorers of music healing, I tend to be very skeptical about assigning musical notes to certain chakras or parts of the body, etc. because most of the people who say these things are not coming from direct experience  And it gets a little ridiculous when people say that the note C# rules the 2nd chakra and F# is ruled by Sagittarius and so on.  Life moves!  Life changes!

However, what I’m about to share is very experiential and it has to do with relationships between musical notes known as Intervals, the mathematical distance between musical tones. As most musicians know, we use numbers to gauge the distance between notes of a melody or harmony.

For example      c d e f g a b c
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

So C to F is known as a 4th or C to D is known as a 2nd. Major or minor, it doesn’t matter. A 3rd is a 3rd a 6th is a 6th and so on.  Now music students are taught these intervals but they are never taught the archetypal energy or feeling of each interval.  Whoa!  Now you are about to discover a whole new universe!

Oddly enough, these energies can be easily found in the major arcana of the Tarot Card Deck. Please don’t be turned off because of the “occult” background of this. As you will see, the realness and solidity of this discovery are quite evident and it may be that the basis of the Tarot comes from ancient Egypt and it is well known that they had an understanding of science that was very powerful.

So here we go!

1   the root         The Magician

All right, this is raw energy, a single note.  From here you can go anywhere. You can become a Beethoven Symphony, a Gospel. Debussy, and so on. You’re free to go anywhere. There is nothing to stop you. You are a magician. Pure energy.

2  the second     The High Priestess

Well, hang in there with me on this.  The second and ‘The High Priestess” are the hardest for me to put to words.  From my understanding, the High Priestess represents an opening to the riches of the subconscious.  The interval itself is a feminine and mystical interval and it does tend to be an opening to the unknown. This interval has to be handled lightly. If it is played together harshly over and over it can sound dissonate, however, if it is played lightly, it has a unique beauty to it, as the music of Bach and Corelli has shown. That’s the best I can do with words regarding this. This does tend to be a rather mystical interval.

3 the third          The Empress

The third is sweet.  And here we are with The Empress and there she is sitting in the garden looking happy and she is pregnant and there are blessings and flowers all around and the birds are singing and everybody is so happy about the empress! The third definitely has a sweetness to it. Mexican folk music is famous for having its melodies played in thirds. The happiness it expresses is almost alcoholic. . It’s like “I am drunk with the love of the mother”. Need I say more? Just listen to it.

4 the forth        The Emperor

All you have to do is listen to this interval and you’ll hear the Emperor coming!  Da-DaDa! It sounds like a trumpet blaring. When you hear it, it sounds like”the Emperor is here”, let’s get to work here on earth. Let’s fly or build a castle or take action!  When this interval is played together it has a “solidity” and hardness to it. The Star Wars theme and the 1950’s Superman theme and most bugle calls begin with a 4th. The Emperor has spoken and now we must act. You can easily hear it. It’s hard to miss.

5 the fifth      The Hierophant

The voice of God. Let’s slow down with this one.  First of all the 5f is probably the most healing interval of all. The Hindus drone 5fs for hours with their ragas. I have read that there was a scientist who had two greenhouses and in one house he had a recording of a perfect 5f droning 24 hours a day and in another greenhouse, no drone. In the greenhouse with the 5f droning, the plants grew and prospered all over the place. In the greenhouse where there was no 5fs droning, not so good. There are many other stories about the healing powers of the 5f. In my own choir, when I have the choir sing 5fs together, it’s like we are in heaven. 5 is mankind’s lucky number.

The tarot card that goes with this is The Hierophant and it is widely misunderstood. Now in most western tarot decks, it shows a picture of a pope or a bishop and that turns people off. However, in ancient Egypt, the Hierophant was an initiate that after much purification could become  “the voice of God”.  A beautiful example of this is Johan Sebastian Bach. In his early 20s he said “The sole purpose of music is none other than the glorification of God” and being a typical German he stayed right with that goal, despite all sorts of criticism and obstacles. And low and behold he became the voice of God. We know this because his music is eternal. Now, 250 years later his music is played all over the world. Everybody plays Bach, Diana Ross and the Supremes, Japanese Sakahachi flute players, flamingo guitar players, jazz and rock players and on and on. And his music still sounds as fresh as it did 250 years ago. His music is like God, eternal, the voice of God.

6 the sixth   The Lovers

Ah, the lovers. All you have to do is listen to it (especially the minor 6th) and you”ll feel “Oh, my darling, if I don’t see you soon, I think I’m a-gonna die”. Back in the 70’s, there was a famous movie call “Love Story” and the theme song was just a succession of 6ths. The famous romantic composer Brahms was famous for his use of 6ths. I almost don’t want to put this card to words cause it’s so full of abandoning love. The interval makes you yearn for more love. Books that write about this card also talk about this energy as a place where you have to make a choice from the heart, like “Am I going to marry her or not”. When I play Tangos or in romantic places in the theater I always go for the 6ths, it works every time.

7 the seventh   The Chariot

The Chariot is an instrument of movement. Have you ever noticed that the 7th (major or minor) is not a naturally stable interval? It tends to always want to move or “resolve”. However, there is one type of music where musicians tend to hold and play the 7th over and over and that’s soul music, especially James Brown and Marvin Gaye. They’ll just pound those minor 7ths on and on. And what does that do to people? It makes people want to mooooove!!!! Oh yes, “I Gotta Move” cause they’re playing those 7ths on and on. Oh yeah, The Chariot card is saying ” Alright, I got my stuff together and both sides of me are balanced and I’m gonna move it with essential power.

8 the eighth   Balance

In balance, we are back to basics. Now we are at the octave. We are now vibrating at twice the speed of the root.  I call this interval heaven because we are now going into a different dimension. We are back where we started only in a higher dimension.  I’m not going to go further in the intervals except to call your attention that the octaves of the intervals tend to be the same energies only in a higher dimension. For example, the octave above the 2nd =High Priestess is the 9th= The Hermit. They both take you inside, The octave of the 3rd =The Empress is the 10th=The wheel of Fortune, both bear fruits of the earth. The octave of the 4th= The Emperor is the 11th= the tarot card Strength and so on.  The same energies only in another dimension.

TURNING THE INTERVALS UPSIDE DOWN

So C to G is a 5f, the Hierophant. Now if you turn it upside down you have G to C, a 4th, the Emperor.  C to E is a 3rd sweet Empress and if you turn it upside down, and E to C becomes a romantic Lovers. C to D is a 2nd the High Priestess which propels you into the subconscious and if you turn it upside down it becomes a 7th which propels you into movement. See the similarities?

THE FOLLOWING IS IMPORTANT

As most of you know, a regular harmonic chord consists of a root, third, and a fifth.

THE ROOT INSPIRES THE PELVIS= THE POWER OF GOD

THE THIRD INSPIRES THE HEART=THE LOVE OF GOD

THE FIFTH INSPIRES THE MIND= THE CLARITY OF GOD

A SHORT ANATOMY CLASS

The bible says God made us in his own image. Well, look in the mirror. Down there in the pelvis is where the power of  God is expressed. Africa, South America, the congas, the drums “I GOT THE POWER!” BOOM BOOM BOOM!! And incidentally, the drug that goes with this is cocaine – Power! Power! & more Power!

In the heart area is where the Love of God is expressed, romance, love, and unity, the Mediterranean, the Tibetan monasteries, Mexico (I dare you to show me a Mexican folk song that doesn’t have the word corasone  (heart) in it. The drug that goes with this is alcohol, a heart drug. Jesus used wine as a sacrament of the heart and have you ever sat down and had a drink with somebody and had a heart-to-heart conversation?

In the head is the Clarity of God, Russian Scientist, German scientist, English Scientist, The Nobel Prize, “now I understand everything!” Oxford and Yale and on and on. The drug that goes with this is LSD, marijuana. some of those modern-day “mood enhancers.

It’s interesting to note that when you play and 135 chords with the 3rd on the bottom, the chord has a compassionate heart feeling to it. Whenever I’m playing for theatre and I want a heart feeling I’ll play a chord with the 3rd on the bottom. If you listen to that type of chord you will easily have a compassionate feeling expressed. Also notice that when you listen to Balinese gamelan music, they always have the third on the bottom, they don’t even go to the root. Bali is an island where a million prayers are said each day and it is the only place where when I teach a workshop, I have to absolutely be aware of spirit guides because the veil is so thin there. And what is the greatest food for intuition and interdimensional communication? Love

Now when you play a 135 chord with the 5f on the bottom, it has an expectancy feeling. In most concertos toward the end, there is a crashing chord with the 5fth on the bottom announcing the cadenza where the soloist is about to dazzle your mind with lots of fast notes and improvisation (voice of God).

So with this in mind, we can see how melodies speak a language. For example, the Star Wars melody begins with a pick-up interval of the 4th below the root =The Emperor (now we’re going somewhere) and it then bangs the root. Then, it flys to the 5fth=The Hierophant (the mind) and then with a few grace notes it flys to the octave( the heavens) then it goes down to the 5fth (the mind)  then it repeats this again, The heavens to the mind, the heavens to the mind, the message is clear!  And then with a few grace notes the first half or the melody ends with the 2nd, the mysterious High Priestess., the feminine creative spirit (Princess Lea, a female Jedi Knight).

So there we are. As time goes on and you remember the energies of these intervals you will discover the hidden messages in melodies and harmonies and have an extra tool to create magic in your own universe and balance the world with your music.

Amen