THURSDAYS RAGA SINGING
and DEVOTIONAL CHANTING

with Silvia Nakkach

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION:
The ragas are the most important link to the essence of Indian classical music. The appreciation and experience of the raga becomes profoundly meaningful to spiritual seekers as well as to the trained musician. The word “rag” is derived from the Sanskrit “raga” which means “color,” or “passion.” Ragas, therefore, may be thought of as an acoustic method of coloring the mind of the listener with an emotion. Ragas are not just musical scales or modes, they are described by master musicians as divinely inspired melodic entities.

This class focuses on the main characteristics of several ragas by cultivating familiarity with the pitches and tonal movement of the alap or their introductory melodic phrases. We will discover the beauty of the shrutis (micro-tones that are revealed in the space between the notes), and the transformational power of the rasas (a rasa is that which gives “taste” to the mind), which relates to aesthetic sentiments such as love, joy, devotion, wonder, heroism, peace, and detachment evoked by the rendering of the ragas.

We will experience raga-based styles of devotional chanting: Dhrupad singing, Saregam, Khyal and Kirtan. Students will be able to appreciate different ragas, create a vocal practice, learn about vocal technique, and get acquainted with various modalities of music healing applications informed by devotional chanting. Ragas are the greatest music teachers, because through the traditional practice of call and response, these awakening melodies stimulate our memory, while refining our senses deeply and delightfully.

Into The Core of The Raga & Rasa System,
we explore the architecture of music and emotions,
unfolding the art melodic movement,
and deepening the experience of MANTRA HEALING

The ragas are the most important link to the essence of Indian classical music. The appreciation and experience of the raga becomes profoundly meaningful to spiritual seekers as well as to the trained musician. The word “rag” is derived from the Sanskrit “raga” which means “color,” or “passion.” Ragas, therefore, may be thought of as an acoustic method of coloring the mind of the listener with an emotion. Ragas are not just musical scales or modes, they are described by master musicians as divinely inspired melodic entities.

This class focuses on the main characteristics of several ragas by cultivating familiarity with the pitches and tonal movement of the alap or their introductory melodic phrases. We will discover the beauty of the shrutis (micro-tones that are revealed in the space between the notes), and the transformational power of the rasas (a rasa is that which gives “taste” to the mind), which relates to aesthetic sentiments such as love, joy, devotion, wonder, heroism, peace, and detachment evoked by the rendering of the ragas.

We will experience raga-based styles of devotional chanting: Dhrupad singing, Saregam, Khyal and Kirtan. Students will be able to appreciate different ragas, create a vocal practice, learn about vocal technique, and get acquainted with various modalities of music healing applications informed by devotional chanting. Ragas are the greatest music teachers, because through the traditional practice of call and response, these awakening melodies stimulate our memory, while refining our senses deeply and delightfully.

Ragas are not just scales, ragas are inspiring melodies that have the power to refine your voice quality, balancing our nervous system, shifting our emotions, and transform consciousness
immediately, deeply and delightfully. Ragas are "alive", have no history since they are renewed each time they are performed, becoming the best music teachers.

The raga is the most important concept that any student of Indian or Western music should understand to seep listening, improvise & compose music. The Hindi/Urdu word "rag" is derived from the Sanskrit "raga" which means "colour, or passion". It is linked to the Sanskrit word "ranj" which means "to colour" (Apte 1987). Therefore rag may be thought of as an acoustic method of colouring the mind of the listener with an emotion. Musically, ragas are melodic arrangements. Their origins is ancient and sacred, they were composed by celestial beings and channeled by Indian Masters and lineages of musicianship through oral transmission. There are 75.000 ragas and they developed through a modal structure. The slow development of the melody is the heart of this music. The haunting melodies an the microtonal intervalic logic are regarded as the “color of the mind” , being the result of tonal arrangements ruled by cosmological and aesthetic laws related with dimensions of light ( i.e.: night and day ). A raga is complete when it achieves its tonal taste or “rasa” which is another element in classical Indian music.

Rasa is perceived as a sentiment, which could be described as an aesthetic experience. Although rasa is unique, in practice we distinguish several “savors” according to the emotion which colors it : erotic love, pathetic, devotional, comic, fearful, repugnant, horrific, heroic, fantastic, furious, peaceful. The individual feels immersed in that mood to the exclusion of all else including himself. Thus, aesthetic experience is a transformation of not merely feeling, but equally of cognition, “ a condensed understanding in the mode of ecstasy “; the ecstasy of the intellect, an ecstasy itself inscrutable and illuminating. In the Vedas the experience of rasa is described as a flash of super-worldly blinding light, which appears to whom the knowledge of ideal beauty is innate and intuitive. It is an experience impossible to analyze.

We will explore the meaning of rasa through images of taste, relish, essence, something like the nectar of the fruit, the best or finest part of it. It is like perfume, which comes from matter but it is not easy to describe or comprehend, since has non-physical properties, often yielding pleasure. In its subtlest sense, rasa comes to signify a state of heightened delight, the kind of bliss that can be experienced only by the spirit ( “ananda”). It is a pure delight that only the presence of a work of art can make as feel. It is perceived as an emotional pleasure, which Hindus refer to as the “taste of the mind”, or the delight of reason, an inspiring energy which is experienced by sharing a feeling and suddenly understanding the essence of a work of art. Therefore, rasa describes a state of enhanced emotional perception produced by the presence of musical energy and is applicable to all creative expression, being particularly powerful in the art of healing with sound and music.

To read more about this topic go to RECOMMENDED READINGS:
• RAGA YOGA
• RASA, INTO THE CORE OF MUSIC HEALING, by Silvia Nakkach, M.A., M.M.T.
• The Architecture of Music

Bibliography:
• The Classical Music of North India, by Ali Akbar Khan, edited by George Ruckert
• My Music, by Ravi Shankar

ALL PROGRAMS REQUIRE PRE-PAID REGISTRATIONS

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The Yoga of the Voice
TRAINING SEMINARS
at The Voice Loft, Emeryville

JUNE 20 & 21
Focus on: Sound Healing Modalities for Creating Songs & Music
Practice and Confidence Enhancing

Focus on: Embracing the Shamanic Power of the Voice
Where is your longing....
How can be explored and vocalized....
How you can selflessly craft your capacity to service others through sound and song....

Silvia in Bahia by Meridian
master photographer Meridian can be reached at travellygirl@yahoo.com

Weekend also includes:

Freeing your Voice: techniques to overcome impediments
Learn Shamanic Chanting & Medicine Melodies accompany yourself by drums and percussion
Open your Heart through Devotional Singing
The Art of Vocal Meditation and Divination
Reviewing of the 108 Vocal Strategies for Improvisation -
Building a repertoire of Shamanic Chants, Incantations & Icaros

Yoga of the Voice™ Certificate

This weekend is a module that applies for 20 hours towards the Yoga of the Voice Certificate

• Certificate Students are highly recommended to attend to this class

• Students can chose to take each module independently or towards the Certificate.

* Everyone is welcome to attend any of the modules. No experience is required.

* Advanced Registration is recommended and required

Upcoming YOGA of the VOICE ™ Seminars that applied towards Certificate hours:

in the BAY AREA:
• JUNE 20 & 21 ~ Creating Songs, Practice & Confidence Enhancing weekend at the Voice Loft
• July 12 - 17 ~ Santa Cruz Mountains Week-long Retreat ( check details on this site)
• October 23, 24 & 25 ~ Yoga of the Voice Training - Module 2 - At the Voice Loft, Emeryville

About the 100- Hour Yoga of the Voice™ Certificate from The Vox Mundi School

ADMISSION & REGISTRATION FEE for the CERTIFICATE (one time only): $200
Admission interview is required, the interview can be processed by phone.
To complete the Certificate students must complete 3 weekend seminars and a week-long retreat.
Each weekend offers 20 hours towards the Certificate
Student accrue 30 hours during the week long retreat in Santa Cruz
and students can also accrue or accumulate HOURS by taking:
~ Study Abroad travels - accrue 30 hours - to Japon, India, Brazil, Morocco, or any group study offered by Vox Mundi Project
~ Taking four weekends and a special individual project - this is a special option for international students, or students from out of town.
~ Students from out of town may apply for a customized schedule of classes that includes special individual projects.

To obtain the Certificate all students must complete an midterm integration paper and CD, and a final individual project.
The 100 hours Certificate must be completed in no more than 18 months for local students and up to 24 months for international students

For Inquires about the Certificate please contact our office at 510- 595 0819

(*) Tuition for Santa Cruz Week-Long Retreat please check further details on the Program Page

“I invite you to the great adventure..” The Mother
THE YOGA of the VOICE
The most accomplished Program of its kind

Integral approach engaging
Body-Mind-Spirit
East/West/ North & South Wisdom
Sound Science
Spirituality
Sacred & Unusual Vocal Arts
Devotional Chanting
Healing Power of Music
Cross-cultural Music Therapy
Shamanic Wisdom
Transformation of Consciousness
Repertoire Development
Improvisation
Cutting-edge Faculty

What is the Yoga of the Voice?

Unlike any other program, the yoga of the voice™ integrates the transformative discipline of yoga with contemporary techniques of chanting, sound healing, music therapy, improvisation, and voice development as a gateway to connect with our true energetic nature. Students discover scientific, intuitive, and creative ways to address any voice impediment while learning new skills to build a solid sound healing practice.

The 100-hour Yoga of the Voice Certificate program is nurtured by a powerful musical lineages providing cross-cultural and stimulating education on the therapeutic, artistic, and transcendental uses of sound, with a renewed spiritual emphasis.

The seminars offer an in-depth study of the different dimensions of the healing voice: the contemplative, the expressive, the shamanic, and the ecstatic. Students learn to embody the quality of singing that transforms energy patterns and emotions, affecting consciousness more efficiently than any other form of sound. Participants become familiar with uses of sound and the voice in yoga, complementary medicine, energy healing, education, performance, and as spiritual practice. The experience supports the aspirant creative and professional path, inspiring deep healing and compassionate insight.

What I will be studying?
Areas of Study

• Sacred Music of The World
• Devotional Chanting & Mantra Medicine
• Shamanic Voices
• The Art of Melodic movement, modes, raga & rasa
• Voice development & The Art of Improvisation
• Sound, Chant, & Music in Healing/ Therapeutic modalities
• Professional Applications
• Repertoire Development
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

• Nada Yoga, Kirtan, Bhakti Yoga and Tibetan spiritual music
• Afro-Brazilian healing songs • Deity invocations • Chants from the Amazon • Sufi Chants • Sonorous & melodious Yogic Practices • Magic seed-syllables • Tuning • Vocal Embellishments • Toning • Resonance • Ancient breathing techniques• Chakras and Subtle Energy Systems • Body postures and Sonorous Mudras • Vocal Meditation • Overtone singing • Contemporary extended vocal techniques • Mystical uses of sound • The effect of sound on the body, the brain, and the mind • Sound Tools as Drones, Tuning forks, bells, and drumming, and digirideu • Intuitive playing skills with simple instruments • Sound and Movement • Conducting sound rituals • Ongoing chanting groups & Music and Sound Healing circles

What can you expect to obtain from this program?

• Personal transformation through a sound
• Practice chanting & music as a sacred art
• Conduct rituals & chanting and study groups
• Access higher states of creativity and liberation through sound
• Learn innovative healing modalities to ‘open’ your voice through ancient breathing and sonorous yogic practices.
• Discover how certain sounds, musical intervals, scales, rhythms, and chants impact specific areas of the brain and the body
• Free oneself from any personal memory of vocal constraint empowering one’s confidence and the readiness to sing.
• Build a practice of chants and sounds that clear, tune, and stimulate the brain and the energy of the charkas.
• Identify ways to transform energy patters and emotional states.
• Learn how to employ musical instruments as healing tools,
• Realize which musical culture awakens your ancestral musical lineage
• Build professional collaborations/networking/ guidance/ tutoring
• Embody divinity through sound, enhancing vitality, and fostering a sense of well-being, openness, and love.
• Become a Certified Sound & Voice Practitioner

Who Should apply?
Musicians & singers, yoga practitioners, health care professionals, clinicians, singers, sound healers, somatic and music therapists, body workers and spiritual seekers

How can you apply this Program?
E-mail or Call to request a phone or personal interview
voxmundi@yahoo.com & (510) 595 0819

About the Program:

Like shamans, yogis, and mystics, today’s sound healing practitioners use sound, music, and the voice as gateways to transcendence and the exploration of consciousness. Integrating science with the wisdom of sacred and aboriginal sound practices, Silvia Nakkach and the Vox Mundi faculty lead participants in an exploration of the role of sound, voice, music, and intention in assisting psycho-spiritual insight and healing.

Merging sound and music therapy practices with the traditions of Indian, Tibetan, and Afro-Brazilian devotional chanting, students learn innovative forms of vocal improvisation, shamanic songs, and divine utterances. Participants will experience an innovative and unique cross-cultural model for using sound, voice, and music in contemporary therapies, with an emphasis on integration and spiritual renewal. In this fascinating seminars information meets inspiration towards a precise and powerful integration in the practitioner personal and professional practice.

With the fast emerging field of Sound and Music in Healing it becomes increasingly important to understand more about how sound and chanting can support therapeutic and growth processes. This program offers an in-depth study of the use of the voice, chanting, and the music of cultures that use sound to transform consciousness and realize healing. The Intensive Certificate is the only of this kind, providing the students with mindful, integral, and stimulating education in an optimum intimate environment for personal and professional development, learning about both practical and transcendental uses of sound, students will be able to go deeper into the experience of the transformative power of sound and the voice.

Using the voice to transform consciousness and promote healing, students will learn a selected repertoire of chants focus on distinct uses of sacred sound from Afro-Brazilian chant, Amazon healing songs, Indian ragas and mantras, and sonorous yogas (ancient yogic practices involving sound). Vocal improvisation, voice range and tone quality are also part of the curriculum of the intensive.

Discovering how through the practice and application of certain sounds, musical intervals and scales, rhythms and chants is possible to impact specific areas of the mind and the body, recognizing immediate ways to transform energy patters and emotional states.

Learning to cultivate familiarity with shamanic forms of vocal expressions and sonorous yogas, such as toning, tuning to the divine energy of seed syllables, invocation, mantras, medicine melodies and vocal meditation and to be able to incorporate these therapeutic practices in daily life and professional practice. Being the finest objective to experience divinity through sound and the devotional nature of sacred chant.

Providing an in-depth understanding of how the integration of chanting, movement and shamanic cosmology becomes a practice of personal empowering and inspiration, realizing improved vitality and spiritual liberation through sound.

Students will discover which musical culture opens personal doorways to open the voice and sing more, experiencing how group chanting encourages kindness and respect for other cultures, traditions and life.

Course Format and Activities

Lecture, discussion, experiential chanting, audition of selected discography, video and digital recording projects, written questionnaire reviews, home assignments and supervision, individual projects, including optional tutoring and internships.

Limited Space Available

- Admission Interview is Required -

TEACHER TRAINING

Photo by Arlene Moscovitch.

Teacher Training is open to all new and regular students. It is a great class that focused on empowering those who would like to teach and lead chanting groups.
The sessions offer technique of group dynamics, keyboard, harmonium and simple instruments playing skills, voice development, and how to prepare and design group and individual session. Although this class can be taken independently, the class offer 10 hours towards the Yoga of the Voice Certificate.

Class Meets:
July 8, 3:30 to 7 PM
July 9, 4:30 to 9:30 (with dinner break)
July 10, 10 to 1:30 PM at The Voice Loft in Emeryville - All the students are invited to our CONCERT July 10 in the evening! at the Unity Church in Berkeley READ MORE

Listen to our Interview at KPFA on Friday July 10 at 11:15AM!

Certificate Students and Teachers-in-Training have the option to attend to this fantastic Training to improve chanting leading, and practice in small groups and all teaching tools, practices and instrument's skills. We will help you with accommodations in the Bay Area - but we need confirmation that you are attending to this Training in advanced. Please do it soon.

Limited Space Available

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LECTURE
The Art of improvisation

Friday, February 29, 7-9pm
Finding Your Inner Musician

WORKSHOP

Finding Your Inner Musician
David Darling and Silvia Nakkach

Saturday, March 1, 10am–5pm
Sunday, March 2, 9am–noon
David Darling and Silvia Nakkach

REGISTER ON LINE

We are all born with the innate ability to sing, to dance, and to live a celebratory creative lifestyle. Music is one of the most natural ways through which we can heal and celebrate our spirit. Singing, chanting, drumming, and playing the piano or any instrument allows us to nurture a loving relationship with ourselves through music.

This workshop provides a humorous and energetic environment for practicing exercises that will deepen our relationship with our own natural musical self. Through improvisational techniques and musical gestures from the music of India, Brazil, Africa, and the West, students discover how distant worlds of music complement and complete each other, engaging in optimally balanced left and right brain activity.

This all-levels workshop is designed to help you develop confidence through creating a positive musical experience and cultivating a balanced approach to a long-term musical journey.

David Darling, cellist, composer, and educator, has been opening hearts to the mystery of sound for four decades. He is celebrated for his energetic, loving, and accepting style in emancipating the musical soul in those he teaches. He has produced numerous recordings, as well as released eight solo albums and more than three dozen collaborative efforts with such diverse artists as Paul Winter and Jan Garbarek.

Silvia Nakkach, MA, MMT, is an award-winning composer and pioneer in the field of sound and transformation of consciousness. She is the founding director of Vox Mundi School of the Voice and a teacher and the academic advisor for the Sound, Voice and Music Healing Certificate at CIIS.

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Medicine Melodies: The Music That Healers Hear
Silvia Nakkach & Val Serrant

Val Serrant

In the Universe, everything sings: plants, animals, waterfalls, bones, people, the stars, the rain, and many things we do not see; even silence makes a sound. The shaman hears the hidden music of the Universe and sings it back through “medicine melodies,” simple tonal configurations that reflect a sacred unity with nature and have the power to heal body, mind, and spirit. Many people in our own culture today are visited by such melodies—as if spontaneous transmissions from nature or the spirit world are “singing in” to the person rather than the person “singing out.”

Medicine melodies can be found in all traditions: from lullabies to Hebrew davennen; the kirtans, mantras, and ragas from India; Tibetan ritual prayers; the zhikrs of the Sufis; Buddhist sutras and tantric chants; and indigenous songs from Africa and the Americas. In this workshop, we will take a musical journey through songs from many of these cultures, exploring how spiritual melodicism and timeless rhythms make potent medicine. We will listen to healing melodies within the music of the classical Western repertoire from Mozart, Mahler, and Bach. And, we will experience the emotional magic that comes from singing the Icaros of the Peruvian Amazon Basin and other shamanic traditions, feeling how this music clears and opens energetic channels, gives birth to kindness, and connects us with love.

This day-long workshop is for anyone who longs to work more knowingly with music and the voice. You will bring home a repertoire of medicine melodies, as well as practical guidance for developing your practice of “singing in.” Bring an instrument if you have one, and a journal.

Read the complete article at: Medicine Melodies. Emotional Magic & Music

SOUND CIRCLE for WOMEN
with Alejandra Ortiz

A Weeklong Creative Expression Retreat
And Chanting Journey

An inspiring way to revitalize your Spring break With extraordinary artist and meditation teacher Mayumi Oda, & Silvia Nakkach, musician

RAJASTHAN

Raga & Dhrupad Singing with great masters
Music Festivals
Excursion to Palaces and
Indigenous Tribes Fairs
Inspiring Music & Dances

Rajasthan is the most is home for the most ancient and
passionate music in India. Lively and joyous rhythms are a delight to hear.
This is India at its best!

KERALA
Daily Yoga of the Voice™ with Silvia
Nada Yoga, Hata Yoga & Kundalini Yoga
Music and Dance Festivals
Visit to Amma Ashram
Tibetan Monasteries and other sacred sites
Ayurvedic Treatments
Beach Paradise
Backwaters Overnight
Excursions and Performances
Mindfulness Practice with the Elements
Relaxation and Spiritual nurturing

“Something opens our wings.
Something makes boredom and hurt disappear.
Someone fills the cup in front of us.
We taste only sacredness.” Rumi

In this musical journeys return to the Source of Nada Yoga & Devotional Chant.
Become an intensive training on healing chant with master teachers, divine voices, in the inspiring ancient and gentle humanity!

Enrich ~ Explore ~ Energize ~ Enchant ~ Celebrate
the Transformative Power of Sacred Chant in Mother India

“The Vox Mundi School of Sound and the Voice has gained an international reputation for offering the highest quality musical journeys around the world for more than a decade, combining natural beauty, music making, ritual dances, cultural insight, spiritual tours, yoga and meditation, and inspiring teachings under the direction of legendary masters of sacred chant. This study tour through the North and the South of India will ignite lifelong connections with the land, the music, and new local friends, becoming an unforgettable ‘ change of heart’ for both the first-time and seasoned traveler who chooses to return every year to tap deeper into the creative power of this learning vacations. “
Silvia Nakkach
Artistic Director, Vox Mundi Project & Study Tour Facilitator

"Silvia is an experienced world traveler who brings genuine warmth, knowledge, and abundance of enjoyment to her precise guidance, students like to call her the Minister of Transportation".