Chakras, healing and the musical scale.

"Many say that life entered the human body by the help of music, but the truth is that life itself is music." Hafiz (Persian Sufi poet)

The finest instrument for perceiving the chakras and other energetic fields is the human sensory system. With remarkably little training it is possible to at least feel the positions of the chakras by their vibrational differences from the rest of the energetic field. We have been doing this for thousands of years. With a little more training it is possible to become aware of the types of energetic frequencies involved and what types of information they contain. Again we have been doing this for thousands of years and it is still taught. (Note: Harmonics Level 2)

However, it is one thing to perceive it is another altogether to attempt to balance or heal energetic centres. One of the most popular ways to attempt this emerging from the 20th century, is through the use of musical tones.

There are many differing views on suitable tones for healing. Various writers and practitioners have detailed particular correspondences between vertebrae and individual notes, (LaSala Kimmel) colour and sound (Hans Cousto) and energy meridians and sound (Steven Birch). ¹ Theo Gimbel, in his book "Healing Through Colour", has an excellent chart of the relationships between vertebrae weight and pitch in male and female spines.16 Hindu Scriptures reveal that certain sounds were considered sacred (Vimuktida) and were regarded as having the capacity to liberate the hearer from the karmic cycle of birth /death / reincarnation. The most famous of these, the sacred word Om, (Aum) is considered in Indian thought to be at one with the rhythms of the universe.² Om is now considered to be the note of C# (136Hz) and is the tuning note for both Sitar and Tibetan bells. However pre-tuning forks, the note was determined by the sound of various animals.¹³

In Hans Jenny's famous experiments with his tonoscope which "transforms sounds uttered into a microphone into their visual representation on a screen", the sounding of Om "produces the circle '0' which is then filled in with concentric squares and triangles, finally producing, when the last traces of the 'm' have died away, a 'yantra' - the formal expression of sacred vibration which is found in many of the world's religions."³ The same relationship of frequency matching the shapes of the actual letters is seen in some of the scripts of other liturgical languages such as Hebrew and High Javanese. ⁴ These were the sacred languages of energetic alchemy, where what was said had a physical and structural sense of meaning. Certain sounds had (have) the power to change the physical world. In India this science of sound was called Sama Veda, the 5th aspect of Vedanta. It may be that sounds relating to each chakra existed in this time. Nonetheless, the concept of the individual chakras resonating to individual notes is not present in the remnants left to us from the ancient Hindu writings.

While the concept of notes pertaining to chakras may not be ancient, it is far from being just a popular 'new age' theme. It is perfectly in accord with the principles of a vibrationary universe and the sacred view of sound present in many religions. Note the start of Genesis in the Christian Bible; "In the beginning was the word." This Christian view of the spiritual usage of sacred sounds continued with Gregorian chants which were used to "help one rise up out of the body."⁵ The Sufi's see music as a manifestation of the spiritual essence of reality and say that it "in point of fact music excels religion; for music raises the soul of man even higher than the so-called external forms of religion."¹⁴ It is well known that the shamans of many cultures have used tones and beat to both stimulate and calm bio-energies. The Australian Aboriginals and American Indian shamans still "use vocal toning and repetitive sound vibration with instruments created from nature in sacred ceremony to adjust any imbalance of the spirit, emotions or physical being."⁶ The vibrations of sound frequencies certainly affect our energetic centres.

There are two common trains of thought concerning the particular resonances of the chakras. The first is that they resonate to C, D,E,F,G,A and B as you go up through the 7 chakras from the base to the top. The second is that everyone has an individual chakra resonance.

The first concept has a lot more to do with convenience than with reality. The C major scale was not a part of Indian traditional sacred music. The major Indian scale that relates to the C - C sequence is the equivalent of F, including the Bb. Also, as Hawkins notes in relation to sound acupoints;7 'The primary acupoint used with the F tuning fork is Du 20, a point often associated with the crown chakra.' She also notes that in China, as well as India, F was a fundamental tone and the tone of the Platonic year which is the amount of time it takes the axis of Earth to complete a full circle. Natural cycle researcher Ray Tomes,8 notes that the harmonics calculated according to the Hz of the ionosphere (the earths electromagnetic zone) exactly match those used in Indian music, in the Indian scale of F. Tomes calculated the Hz of the ionosphere by dividing the circumference of the earth (40,000Km) into the speed of light (300,000 Km/s) to give the 7.49-7.5Hz generally known as the Shumann wave. This is generated by lightning strikes in the ionosphere. Another parallel is the central area of activity of a therapeutic touch practitioner, recorded by both Dr John Zimmerman, - also in the range of 7 - 8 Hz.9 and the areas of activity in natural healers measured by physicist Rupert Sheldrake. Shel drake noted that the healers were in exact 'beat' to the Shumann wave.

While the F major scale would seem to be a natural harmonic of the earth, generated in relation to natural laws, the C major scale is not. However, the F major scale in western music isn't a "natural" harmonic sequence either, due to the invention of "mean temperament." This came about several hundred years ago with the invention of the piano. The existing microtonal systems were replaced by 12 notes that were pushed and pulled into position to create what is now termed "mean temperament." This allowed tunes to be composed for the piano and led to the abandonment of the microtonal systems. It also meant that 6 of the 7 individual notes in an octave had to be altered. So the 7 note western scale matching the chakra system has 6 contrived notes. The application by some of the western concert pitch F major scale (F,G,A,Bb,C,D,E,F) for individual notes for chakra resonance is clearly also based on convenience. If Tomes belief ('Harmonics, Pythagoras, Music and the Universe' and personal correspondence) that the true Hz for A is 450 Hz (based on the 60th harmonic of the Shumann wave) rather than the accepted concert pitch of 440 Hz, it would put the accepted concert pitch scale even further out of the true frequency range. Obviously, we will have to venture outside the piano for accurate tones for chakras.

Then there is the question of sequences. The tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone, semitone sequence of major scales is only one of many possible musical modes which have other patterns of tones and semitones. Even its naming as the major scale is only 400 years old and was based on a definition of the Roman theorist Glareanus who confused the names of the original Greeks modes.¹⁰ So, historically, we're not really sure whether it was ever referred to as major or why. Again, convenience seems to have had a lot to do with why the major scale is linked to the chakra system.

The Cymatics films of Hans Jenny and his 1967 book, 'Cymatics - The Structure and Dynamics of Waves and Vibrations.' (following on from the work of 19th century physicist Chladni) give us an insight into the musical interval structure of linked energetic centres. Jenny vibrated metal discs (with materials such as sand, spores, iron filings and water on top) to many different sounds including rising pitches, in an effort to understand the structures of frequency. The rising scale demonstrations showed clearly defined changing patterns of structure / fluidity / structure / fluidity etc on the metal discs, following rising musical frequencies.

There is an interesting match-up here, to the theory of rays and their interaction put forward in Radionics. As Radionics researcher David Tansley notes; 'The seven rays are divided into the rays of love and the rays of will. The rays 2,4,and 6 (heart, brow and solar plexus chakras) are along the line of love, they interact and have the capacity to work well together. The rays 1,3,5 and 7 (crown, throat, sacral, base chakras) are the rays of will, and they too work well together and interact with ease.'¹¹ In music, the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th notes of an octave give us a major chord and the 2nd, 4th and 6th a minor. As a practitioner working with the chakras for many years, I have noted correspondances between the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th or base, solar plexus, throat and crown and between the 2nd, 4th and 6th or sex, heart and brow. In my diagram of the chakra figure 8's on Alan Kazlev's 'The Chakras' website, it is apparent that the 2nd, 4th and 6th chakras are the centres of the individual figure 8's while the 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th chakras are at the outer edges and joining points of the three figures of 8.

(Note: This diagram indicates 3 figure 8's. The first figure 8 joins the lower three chakras. The second the higher three chakras and the third links the two sets by inclusion of the highest chakra of the lower set - the solar plexus - and the lower of the higher set - the throat - through the heart.)

This musical chord sequences appear to parallel with the discoveries of Jenny concerning fluid and solid states of structure. They may also relate to the work of Belgian physicist Ilya Prigogine who won the 1977 Nobel prize for his 'Theory of Dissipative Structures - a kind a chaos theory. He showed that a period of dissolution is required before any system-whether a society, a solar system, or a molecule-can jump to a higher level of organization.'¹² This relates to the major/minor chord sequence referred to above but it might be more relevant to the 'chakra web' concept of Alice Bailey. In her 'Esoteric Healing' the web is seen as a fluid state between the chakras. This also appears to fit in with the fixed and fluid structures of Jenny. Note: The concept of dissolution may really reflect our society's attachment to fixed systems. Transition phases are usually considered 'in-between' phases rather than integral parts of a dynamic system.

What do we have in the end? Certainly no piano and no tempting easy solutions. Prigogine's 'Theory of Dissipative Structure' sheds some light on the structural formation of energy centres and should help us in rediscovering the actual sound/chakra resonances. But until we have more trained people able to focus on the centres and give a clear account of the actual feelings of certain sounds, we will be guessing.

Of course, all this presupposes a defined pitch for each centre. Many disagree with this. The German classical pianist and music teacher Anuparada taught me the technique of individual sound resonance of chakras, while at the Rajneesh Ashram in Pune, India in 1986. In this technique, you are taught to open the throat and to find your lowest base note, which is called the base chakra note. This differs greatly between individuals. From there you go up the scale and resonate the other chakras by focusing on them and singing into them. There is no question that you can achieve a vibration of sorts using this technique and also the C, D, E, F, G, A and B approach and intuitively toning to the chakras. However, the outcomes are all different and could relate to the old adage of energy follows thought as easily as to harmonic resonance.

Conclusions

We need to establish a workable way forward, towards an experimental examination of sequences and particular tones. The structural diagrams of the chakras survive and may also help in defining the true frequencies if we can understand how to 'reverse' the process of Hans Jenny and generate the sound by the form.

We are now at the edge of re-discovering a science and a whole 'new' world of discovery awaits us. As Inayat Khan notes, 'Music is sound and rhythm. And if sound and rhythm were understood in their nature and character, then music would not only be used as a pastime, but would become a source of healing and upliftment.'¹⁵

References
1.	Hawkins, Heidi. M.Ac. L.Ac. The Healing Power of Music. 1994 Part of Masters Thesis in Acupuncture. Northwest Institute of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine
2.	NAD: Understanding Raga Music by Sandeep Bagchee, The New Oxford History of Music, vol. 1
3.	Blair, Lawrence. Rythyms of Vision. Paladin 1976. p-131
4.	(Blair, p-132)
5.	Hawkins, Heidi. M.Ac., L.Ac. The Healing Power of Music.
6.	Souza, Julianna. RN, HNC, http Sound, Music, & Medicine.(web)
7.	Hawkins, Heidi. M.Ac., L.Ac. The Healing Power of Music (as above)
8.	Tomes, Ray. 'Harmonics, Pythagoras, Music and the Universe' (web)
9.	Oschman, James. L. Energy Medicine. Churchill Livingstone 2000.p87
10.	Duarte, John. Melody and Harmony for Guitarists. Universal Edition 1980
11.	Tansley, David. Chakras, Rays and Radionics. Saffron Walden 1996 p42
12.	Borysenko, J and M. The Power of the Mind to Heal. Hay House 1994 p82
13.	Sufi , Inayat Khan. Music. Sh. Muhammad Ashraf. Lahore Pakistan. p20
14.	Sufi, Inayat Khan. p3
15.	Sufi, Inayat Khan. p15
16.	Gimbel,T.. Healing Through Colour. CW Daniel. 1980. p 118

Kevin Farrow

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