dane rudhyar - the rebirth of hindu music

8/13/2019 Dane Rudhyar - The Rebirth of Hindu Music

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Table of Contents

Foreword to the Second Edition

1.The Age of Purification

2.Living Tones or Intellectual otes!

".Seeds of Sound

#.$escending and Ascending %usic

&.The 'eo(etr) of %usic

*.%elodies and S)(+honies

,.%usic and Civili-ation
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Foreword to the Second Edition

The ebirth of /indu %usicwas written in July, 1926, while I was temporarily living in

Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. It followed y a year the writing of a mu!h longer volume, The

ediscover) of %usic, whi!h has remained unpulished. "or several years efore writing

these oo#s, I had een studying what was then availale of $riental musi! and espe!ially

oo#s dealing with it % parti!ularly a few e&!ellent wor#s y "ren!h musi!ologists and

historians. ' remar#ale performer of (indu musi! and dan!e, )agini *evi, the wife of a

highly !ultured Indian, Mr. Ba+pai, urged me to write down what we had een dis!ussing

while I was in ew -or# during the winter of 192 and 1926, and I a!!eeded to her wish.

/he oo# was pulished in 1920 y the /heosophi!al Pulishing (ouse in 'dyar, Madras,

India, in oth hard!over and papera!# editions. /he oo# was never adeuately distriuted

in 'meri!a for at the time only a very few people had any interest at all in oriental musi!,

whi!h most musi!ians !onsidered 3primitive3 and not worth studying. /he tide egan to turn

when the !omposer (enry 4i!hheim traveled to Japan, Java and Bali, and on his returninterested 5eopold tow#ows#i, who a!!ompanied him on a trip to these !ountries % ut

not to India.

My first !onta!t with (indu musi! had een in Paris, early in 1917, when I met a young

"ren!h !omposer, *elage, who had traveled to India and written a few lovely songs ased

on his rememran!es of the vo!al and instrumental musi! that had fas!inated him. 'out

si& years later, my deep interest in the philosophies of India and in /heosophy enaled me

to see in what I had read !on!erning (indu musi! and !ulture a virant manifestation of the

metaphysi!al and o!!ult !on!epts whi!h had fired my youthful mind.

In writing The ebirth of /indu %usic, I had hoped to have at least some slight influen!e

among Indian musi!ians having some familiarity with the 8est. I had #nown

oomaraswamy, the well:#nown author of The $ance of Shivaand, I elieve, the dire!tor

of the $riental department in a Boston museum, and he had mentioned the harm done to

(indu musi! y the in!reasing use of "ren!h:made harmoniums tuned to our 8estern tonal

system. (aving een orn in Paris, I felt a #ind of 3#armi!3 pressure urging me to try to lead

(indu musi!ians to a deeper understanding of the philosophi!al and o!!ult asis of the

musi! they played % a asis whi!h, I was told, they had forgotten. In 192, I tried to get a

s!holarship to go to India in order to study the different musi!al systems of that vast

!ountry whi!h, at that time, was not yet freed from British imperialism. But su!h a pro+e!t

was +udged too 3far:out3 y the a!ademi! !ommittees in !harge of dispensing grants.

"ifty year later, we have witnessed the e&odus of many young 4uropeans and 'meri!ans to

India in the hope of finding in that an!ient land what neither a!ademi! intelle!tualism nor

the materialisti! and automated usiness:world !ould offer. /he spread of phonograph

re!ords ;there were hardly any of 'siati! musi! when I wrote this oo#< has allowed an

in!reasing numer of persons to gain at least a superfi!ial a!uaintan!e with non:4uropean

musi! and musi! s!hools and universities have gradually egun to feature studies of


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$riental musi!. /he (ippie generation dis!overed yoga, meditation and )avi han#ar % as

well as psy!hedeli!s, whi!h fostered su+e!tive e&perien!es that made them even more

sus!eptile to the eually su+e!tive moods and feelings radiating from (indu musi!.

/his new edition of The ebirth of /indu %usicis identi!al to the original one. It would

have een impossile for me to modify some paragraphs without !hanging the whole oo#."ifty years ma#e a great deal of differen!e in the thin#ing and the style of a writer. My view

of 8estern musi!, and parti!ularly of what has happened in the field of 'meri!an musi!

sin!e 19=>, has undergone some transformation % or rather it has e!ome tempered y the

passage of time and y often frustrating e&perien!es in my !onta!ts with other !omposers,

!ondu!tors and pianists. /he musi!al situation has !hanged greatly during the last forty

years, espe!ially after 8orld 8ar II and what I dreamed of as the 33yntoni! )evolution?

has ta#en uite une&pe!ted forms. 4le!troni! and !omputer musi! are introdu!ing new

possiilities, ut only at the te!hni!al level so far. If there really is a 3revolution,3 it is

spreading slowly, and it still does not operate in terms of the deeper, philosophi!al aspe!ts

of tone and musi! to whi!h I had attempted to draw musi!ians3 attention. It may e that the

new edition of this oo#, and some other writings I am underta#ing, will find more re!eptive

minds. ome of the 3seed:ideas3 that are eing sown will, I elieve, sooner or later

germinate among the men and women who are not only dreaming of a ew 'ge, ut ta#ing

definitive transformative steps toward the ?regeneration of the individual? I pro!laimed as

an inelu!tale ne!essity in the last paragraph of this oo#.

8hen one is young, one tends to live in a su+e!tive world of !ons!iousness and to follow

with enthusiasm paths that too often return to their starting points, e!ause one la!#s

o+e!tivity and impersonal understanding. 's I write these introdu!tory notes, I am aout to

meet my 07th irthday I am still very usy wor#ing on new oo#s and !omposing musi!.My asi! vision of the future has not een altered the world has !hanged, yet it is still very

mu!h the same, e&!ept that oth the pro!esses of disintegration and potential reirth have

moved !loser to what seems to e an unavoidale !risis. In 192, I felt !ertain a new world

war would !ome. ow I !annot e so youthfully sure of anything % parti!ularly of what will

happen to musi! all over the world.

Philosophers do not !ause things to happen, ut it should e their tas# to throw the light of

meaning upon what is ta#ing pla!e. 5ately, after a !ouple of !enturies of unrestrained and

often !atastrophi! adventures in s!ien!e and te!hnology, we are witnessing, the rise of

3philosophers of s!ien!e.3 It may e that after many and !onfusing revolutionary !hanges in

the world of musi!, philosophers of musi! may !ome to see, ;eyond the professionalism

and !ommer!ialism of so mu!h that today passes for musi!,< the foundations on whi!h all

musi! depends for vitality and spiritual effe!tiveness. If my wor# on musi! and !ulture has

!ontriuted to the emergen!e of su!h a philosophy of musi! % musi! in oth its !on!rete

and its ar!hetypal aspe!ts % I shall !onsider my repeated attempts not to have een in

vain.


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Palo 'lto, alifornia

ovemer =, 19@0


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Cha+ter 0ne

The Age of Purification

These are the ti(es that call u+on all (en, 4astern or 8estern, high or low, for

purifi!ation and reirth. /he stream of the an!ient 'ryanA wisdom and !ulture has nearly

dried up in the wastes of modern India. /he ideals whi!h a Pythagoras, a Plato, a Para!elsus

tried to impress upon the young 4uropean !iviliation have een distorted and often

efouled. ' ma!hine:into&i!ated world, lost in peripheri! and sensorial a!tivities, has

forgotten how to loo# within at the !enter, where Ishwara, the elf, aides for ever, where

only may e grasped the true intonation of the musi! of the (eart, the solar tones of the 22

srutiswhi!h are the dire!t revelation of /one.

8hen #nowledge de!ays, when dharma is no longer per!eived, !iviliation e!omes rapidly

distorted, then disintegrates, and musi!, whi!h is the !learest mirror of !iviliation, loses its

true intonations, its inner strength of tone, and e!omes a mere repetition of formulas and

modes whi!h, have lost their vital meaning and no longer rouse in ature and in manpowers and visions, ut only please the senses or thrill the intelle!t. "eats of virtuosity are

applauded. /he singer, having lost the sense of the real dharma of musi!, !eases to e

satisfied with the performan!e of tones or melodies whi!h are true, and wants to produ!e

what is original. /he saddest page of all time is written in the history of Indian !ulture, as

musi!ians hypnotied y the false or in!omplete #nowledge of 4urope, a #nowledge at any

rate leading to an entirely different type of musi!al e&pression, ow efore the dreadful

harmoniums whi!h are !ursing the land of the )ishis, whi!h no 4uropean musi!ian of the

slightest distin!tion would ever tolerate in his home.

/here is only one great and universal purifierC spiritual #nowledge. ri Drishna pro!laimed

this one great truth five thousand years ago, and it is true today as ever. (umanity needs

spiritual #nowledge. iviliation !an only e regenerated y spiritual #nowledge. o reirth

of musi! will e possile without it. piritual #nowledge is /ruth, asolute e!ause

!hangeless it is Sat)a and in our present Dali -uga no purifi!ation !an ta#e pla!e whi!h is

not ased on Sat)a, whi!h is not the individual3s or the ra!e3s effort toward the new Sat)a

uga, or Eolden 'ge, whi!h is to su!!eed our age of dar#ness, our age of !onfusion and

de!ay indeed ut this is alsothe time of our motherhood when we may !arry in our own

soul the seeds of the !oming era and e purified therey.

It is true that during the fall season whi!h is the Dali -uga of the year, the tree after having

donned its yellow roe sheds its leaves whi!h de!ompose and return to the soil as !hemi!alelements, and the !y!le of vegetation is !losed ut it is then also that amidst the de!ay of

greens and even of fruits, the seeds of the year to !ome, of the new !y!le of vegetation, are

sown. $n the surfa!e of the earth seeds and de!ayed leaves mi& ut the seeds whi!h are

strong are not tou!hed y de!ay. /hey are inDali, the great Mother:4arth, ut not ofDali

-uga. /hey fe!undate the soil, they ta#e from the soil !hemi!als for growth. -et they remain

what they always are, the vehi!les of this or that vegetale spe!ies, the instruments


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through whi!h the Eenius of the spe!ies or $evamanifests, as the deva of a ragor tone

manifests through the vina.

/he seeds are true. /hey are not often eautiful outwardly, as eauty is understood today

ut they are true and !hangeless. "or the seed of this plant this year and the seed of that

other plant of last year are truly one, as the sun of this spring and the sun of any otherspring are one. /he form is un!hanged the vitality is un!hanged the taste is un!hanged.

/he seed falling in the soil during Dali -uga and the seed germinating in another yuga are

the same that whi!h is now was in the eginning. /hat whi!h is the eginning and end of

all this is true. Jesus saidC ?I am the alpha and the omega,? the first and the last letter.

5i#ewise the musi! of the ra!ial eginnings and that whi!h is seen as the seed during the

last period of the !y!le are true musi!. /hey are made of tones in whi!h the devas may

in!arnate in other words, of tones whi!h are alive with the power of the pirit e!ause they

are true. (indu musi! wants to find the seed:tones whi!h it has nearly lost, whi!h it has

pra!ti!ally lost as far as the general run of puli! performan!es is !onsidered. But it will not

find them y as#ing the 8est for them for the 8est has forgotten for nearly twenty

!enturies the e&isten!e of tones whi!h are living seeds and living souls. Musi! to the 8est

means something else than what it meant to India in her greatest periods, as we shall see

presently and to !onfuse the two dhar(asor the two paths of Indian and 8estern musi!

is the worst thing whi!h !ould happen to Indian musi!ians, and it has happened already in

more ways than one.

Euro+ean (usic +ro+er had its source in the great efor(ation of the sith

centur) 3.C.initiated y Pythagoras, the /ea!her of lonia or Eree!e, avanachar)aas

India #nows him, or Pita 'uruas his name really was, the "ather of all 8estern tea!hers orgurus. 8ith Pythagoras not only 4uropean musi!, ut what to our present humanity

8estern !iviliation and musi! represent, egins 4uropean !iviliation eing ut the first a!t

of the vast drama of 8estern !iviliation whi!h is now eing !entered in the 'meri!an

!ontinent. /his first a!t, li#e many first a!ts, has proven to e really nothing ut a

transition, a heterogeneous mi&ture of pseudo:4astern and pseudo:8estern ideals distorted

y the "eudal tates and an amitious and politi!al hur!h. Perversion egan when

Pythagoras3 !hool at rotona ;outhern Italy< ro#e down, was destroyed and Pythagoras3

tea!hings e!ame distorted y students who #new very little of them and !ared still less

aout preserving them integrally. 4soteri! groups remained and never disappeared entirely

from 4urope. Platonists, eoplatonists, Enosti!s, the few true 'l!hemists and )osi!ru!ians

and many other groups of so:!alled ?hereti!s? lived throughout the !enturies, ut as more

or less se!ret organiations, hunted down y the hur!h, urnt alive, defamed up to the

present day while offi!ial 4urope lived in wars and hatreds, untrue to the spirit of

hristianity as Eree# !ulture had een untrue to the Pythagorean spirit.

/he Pythagorean system of musi!, misunderstood and perverted, lended with 'siati!

reminis!en!es, e!ame the Eree# musi! of !lassi!al times. /he Enosti! !hants and sa!red


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melodies of a Bar *aisan, an 'rius, a Mani and many other piritual /ea!hers who were also

musi!ians, were stolen y the "athers of the atholi! hur!h and after a few alterations

e!ame liturgi!al hymns and mediaeval plain !hant in general. /hey lost their deeper !osmi!

signifi!an!e and e!ame mere melodies, patterns of musi!al notes, more and more

intelle!tualied as !enturies rolled y. In the twelfth and thirteenth !enturies a few greatmusi!ians, mostly un#nown, !ontemporaries of the eually un#nown ar!hite!ts who uilt the

wonderful Eothi! !athedrals, egan a definite s!hool of polyphony on Pythagorean

prin!iples, a s!hool very mu!h misunderstood so far, the main figure of whi!h was Perotin.

But polyphony soon too# another turn whi!h, though it might have een a ne!essity then,

yet led musi! toward a !easelessly greater degree of intelle!tualiation. 8ith 4uropean

!lassi!al musi!, with the wor#s of Ba!h, 4uropeanism in musi! !omes to its !ulmination,

romanti!ism whi!h followed after Beethoven eing a reellion against 4uropeanism and in a

sense the Dali -uga of 4uropean musi!, a !risis of irth whi!h has led to the first

manifestations of a new 8estern musi!, first with the great )ussian !omposer !riain, then

with a few young 'meri!an pioneers little #nown as yet.

4uropeanism in musi! typified y Ba!h, y tonalities and the prin!iple of eual

temperament, y fugues and !ounterpoint, y the development of instrumental musi! and

of large or!hestras, et!. fulfilled a mission. /hough it has een ut the intelle!tual shadow of

the spiritual reality whi!h would logi!ally grow out of the true Pythagorean ideals and whi!h,

we hope, the future will reveal to us in 'meri!a, yet it prepared the way for what may

!ome, and great musi!ian souls have !omposed great wor#s in spite of the limitations and

!rudity of the materials they had to use. ' ew Musi! of the 8est is going to manifest soon,

not in a 4urope e!oming more and more artifi!ial, spiritually dead and rea!tionary, ut in

the ew 8orld where a new !iviliation is slowly eing uilt, unnoti!ed as yet y the general'meri!an people at present stultified y !ommer!ialism and !on!entration on material

prosperity and material te!hni!al organiation.

But neither musi!al 4uropeanism nor even the new efforts in 'meri!a have any essential

message for Indian musi!ians at the present time. /he 8est ought to !on!entrate upon the

regeneration of 8estern !iviliation, and India on the reformation of her own half:forgotten

!iviliation of pre:hristian !enturies. onfusion of duties is dangerous. (owever, the !ase

of a 8esterner is different in that he will find that all true spiritual tea!hers of the 8est

have studied and een initiated into the ar!hai! 'ryan wisdom of the )ishis, that therefore

as soon as he wishes to go to the sour!e of #nowledge dire!tly, he must travel in the spirit,

if not in the flesh, to the Mountains wherefrom the 'ryan ra!e, of whi!h he is a part,

originatedC he must go to the eed, and the eed is in 'sia, not in modern India proper.

It is not in India proper if we !onsider the greater !y!le of the present humanity ut if we

restri!t ourselves to the last five thousand years whi!h, in a sense, mar# a new period in

human development and !an e !onsidered as a !omplete whole, as the prologue and thesis

of this Dali -uga, then we find that in India lived and taught those Ereat Beings who are the

ouls and $riginal Impulses of the yuga, and from whom the /ruth and /one of the !y!le


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emanated, as the form and vital energy of the plant emanates from the seed whi!h is a little

sun in!arnated into the earthly soil, the pirit in the ody. 8e are spea#ing here of ri

Drishna, Eautama the Buddha and an#ara!harya. /he former died in =1>2 B.., the latter

two lived twenty:five !enturies later eing !ontemporaries with Pythagoras. 'nother, great

period we find around the !lose of the fourteenth !entury whi!h mar#s the universal)eformation of modern time, in /iet and India as well as in 4urope, shortly after whi!h a

new era egins with the dis!overy or rather redis!overy of 'meri!a in 1792.

/hese !y!les and many others less important, !onstitute the framewor# of our re!ent

!iviliation. iviliation !annot e understood without the #nowledge of ra!ial !y!les and of

the asi! meaning and musi! !annot e understood outside of !iviliation. /he history of

musi! is the history of man and vi!e versa. Man is the tone:produ!er and his deeds are

utteran!es all these life:utteran!es !onstitute the individual ragof the individual orn out

of the ra4tiof his own heart wherein his own soul dwells in silen!e, or rather in the

unmanifested /one, the inaudile 'FM. o ri Drishna is portrayed as the flute:player

improvising in the many ragsand dan!ing, the dan!e of life materialiing the tones. 8hat

the flute symolies in the ody, all mysti!s and students of o!!ultism #now. It is said also

that the first !ry of a !hild gives out the tone of his own eing, that it is the first manifested

'FM % first the inrushing of the whole universe into the lungs as magneti! air stamping

upon the !hild3s lood the virations of the stars, then the response of the eing, the first

emotion of selfhood, the first assertion of the ?a? in sound, the seed5tone of all hu(an

songs.

In India the seed:tone of this present era was sounded, and % Indian musi!ians must

reawa#en in themselves the memory of it if they want to e true to their souls as Indians,

ut still deeper, as individual selves. "or thus only !an they perform their musi!ians3dharma for thus only !an they fulfill in the great 8orld Musi! the part whi!h is theirs y

nature and irthright.

(ere truly spiritual #nowledge proper as well as musi!al #nowledge is meant. But how !an

these two e separated in a musi!ian who is true to his or her higher destinyG (ave not the

great Indian singers of the past een men of great spiritual stature, as!eti!s and )ogisor

dis!iples of great saintsG *oes not the very term srutimean divine revelation, the word of

the Euru, as well as the very !ells of the musi!al organismG *oes it not indi!ate !learly

enough that musi! isa divine revelation greater in a sense than that whi!h !an e uttered

y words, as it may rea!h eyond words to the very !enter of the (eart *o!trineG /ones

originate in the heart as the old hinese !easelessly repeated for in the heart of Man is the

little sun, the little lue flame of the real sun, Ishwara, that is the swaraor tone of the

elfC Ich, I.

piritual #nowledge alone purifies. It urns the dross of generations it !larifies the water

whi!h traveling far from the mountain sour!e has a!!umulated so mu!h filth. Indian

musi!ians !an !ome to the sour!e if they only want to #now and to dare, e!ause this

sour!e is at the !enter of their heart. /hey have let the sour!e dry up and now, as they


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!ome as#ing other ra!es for water and #nowledge, what they re!eive is the water whi!h

on!e was pure at the sour!e, ut now is !orrupted and !an no longer uen!h. *ig deep

down where the well spouted with the pi!# of !on!entration study y the power of life still

more than y the mere reading of oo#s, the #ey to whi!h is nearly lost and the true

In!antation of the eginning will e heard whi!h will reopen the world of tones that areliving and thus have the power to regenerate living eings.

Eo a!# to the sour!e. It is the eternal )eality, the !hangeless ustan!e. It is never far

away, only we shut ourselves from it e!ause we are afraid and e!ause we are wea#

!hildren of a wea#ened humanity. 8e have neither mus!les nor spiritual will. (ow then

!ould we singG "or singing means oth mus!les and spiritual will, in all the many meanings

of the terms. /he sour!e of musi! is the elf, At(a, the Breath:Motion and what is the

sustan!e of musi! if not soundG piritual #nowledge for a musi!ian means therefore the

#nowledge of the elf and the #nowledge of sound. $f the latter 8estern s!ientists have

learned a small, very small !hapter whi!h they !all the s!ien!e of a!ousti!s. But !uriously

enough this s!ien!e of a!ousti!s whi!h deals with sound !annot even tell what is the nature

of sound, as we shall soon see. ound must e understood in all its aspe!ts, metaphysi!al

as well as physi!al. It is the a5/o5a4tiof the 4gyptians, the un:Eod, +honewith the

Eree#, ut also the song of the irens who are the Eree# 'andharvasrevealing to men the

se!rets of wisdom, the Fohatof /ietan wisdom, and in a sense )udra, or udh5a, the

red Power of the in!arnating soul and of osmi! *esire the twenty:two srutiseing related

to the eleven )udras, and to the eleven:year !y!le of solar magnetism ;sunspots !y!le as it

is #nown y 8estern s!ien!e


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the modern musi!ian is more or less afraid or ashamed of elieving what the supposedly

wise 8esterners have s!orned as fairy tales. (e !annot go eyond the allegori!al gar to

the law whi!h it reveals, and he has no other way save either to depend on handed down

#nowledge a!!epted on faith ut neither !riti!ied nor philosophi!ally understood, or else to

swing to the !ult of 4uropean material gods and read the an!ient te&ts in the light of a4uropeanied intelle!t. 8hile the latter may e ale to thin# in terms of laws, yet those laws

are not universal, e!ause they rest merely on sense e&perien!e or intelle!tual spe!ulation,

e!ause they posit as an evident fa!t a false unity of musi!al sustan!e and #nowledge, a

unity rooted in the falla!ies or at est half:truths of 4uropeanism. 8hat 4urope understands

as sound is merely the shadow or material shell of the true ound, of the 'ryan 6ach. It is

godless, soulless and toneless sound, as 4uropean feudal so!iety was, and still is, merely a

form, a ody without a soul.

It is true that sin!e a !entury or two very fine e&periments have een made in 4urope

!on!erning the produ!tion of the +h)sicalvirations of sound. But while a few phenomena

have een studied, the interpretations proposed have een mostly inadeuate, not to say

naive and some of the est a!ousti!ians in 'meri!a today admit the fa!t. (elmholt, sadly

worshipped y several (indu writers on musi!, analyed fundamentals, overtones and the

li#e, ut does he really e&plain satisfa!torily the produ!tion of overtonesG ot in the least.

(ow !an laws then e dedu!ed from an un#nown something

But if the (indu musi!ian would go to his ar!hai! re!ords of 'ryan wisdom, study with a de5

Euro+eani-edmind what is said of sound, of the oma sa!rifi!e, of the nadis, of the

various #inds of reaths, of the various !onditions of 6ach% even if these su+e!ts seemed

too foridding if he would ponder upon the meaning of the srutis, of the three gra(as,

des!ending and as!ending if he would try to understand the old mythologi!al tales aoutgods and devas, espe!ially those related to musi! and the 'andharvas if he would only

study the root:meaning of musi!al ans#rit terms and thus get a glimpse of the mysteries

hidden in the names of the elements of musi! % then the real and universal laws of musi!

would e revealed to him, and thus the very laws of !osmi! evolution.

It is not that the author of this small and very limited wor# !laims to have any e&tensive

#nowledge of the aove:mentioned su+e!ts. ' 4uropean y irth, 'meri!an y self:

adoption, he has ut gleaned a few ideas and truths here and there ut these have already

een su!h an inspiration, not only to his !reative wor# as a !omposer, ut to the wor# of life

itself, that he feels most !ertain that, for those who y irth, edu!ation and temperament

are so near the ar!hai! do!trines, the harvest whi!h would follow su!h a philosophi!al and

s!ientifi! study would e immeasurale. It would open the gates of ound within and would

release vital powers whi!h, if offered upon the altar of ra!ial and musi!al reirth, would

really mean a new life.

But the purifi!ation must e threefold, of mind, soul and ody. (indu musi! must e purified

of everything whi!h !ame from 8estern invaders, even sin!e the time of 'le&ander. It must

e mentally pure from all the a!!retions and deposits of the mediaeval period with its


12/72

in!oherent emotionalism. It must free itself from 4uropean trends of thought and spe!ial

attitudes to musi!. /he 4uropean sense of musi! is most valuale at least in part. But it is

valuale onl)for 8esterners at present. 8e say ?sense of musi!,? e!ause, that is what is

at sta#e. /he !rude falla!y of trying to see ma+or s!ales in (indu rags, though amaingly

widespread, is not so dangerous as the sutle insidious turn of mind whi!h seems manifestamong a !ertain !lass of (indu musi!ians and whi!h !reates a distrust of the an!ient 'ryan

do!trines and a more or less !ons!ious feeling that modern 4uropean methods must e

followed if real musi!al #nowledge is to e found, that the asi! !lassi!al !on!epts of musi!al

note, interval, mode, melody have something asolutely true, true for India as well as for

the 8est.

/his is not so. lassi!al 4uropean musi! is merely 4uropean and nothing else. It stands or

falls with 4uropean ideals and !iviliation. /he very foundations and sustan!e of (indu

musi! are asolutely different from those of 4uropean musi!. /here is pra!ti!ally not one

prin!iple of 4uropean musi! whi!h !ould e transferred to (indu musi! without poisoning it.

/here is, as we shall see later, an asolute of musi!, the law of sound, whi!h is universally

true. Pythagoras taught it, as undoutedly the (indu )ishis did. But 4urope has perverted

this law, if not altogether forgotten it. ' few 4uropeans, li#e Dathleen !hlesinger, whose

wor# when finished and !ompleted will e invaluale to (indu musi!ians, are rea!hing

toward this musi!al asolute, toward that whi!h is at the root of the true musi! of the 8est

;of whi!h 4uropean musi! as a 8hole was ut the shadow< and of the true musi! of the

4ast:8est and 4ast eing ta#en here as the two astra!t poles of human !iviliation. But

these are solitary e&!eptions, reels against the false do!trines of 4urope, now e!oming

worse than ever in the sphere of musi! under the leadership of the new generation of

rea!tionaries, whi!h today are dominating 4uropean musi!, as the neo:feudalisti! system offas!ism is pervading the sphere of 4uropean politi!s under one name or another.

Let us free /indu (usicfrom the poison of 4uropean intelle!tualism ut this must mean

to free also the soul of the musi!ian from the fear of eing true to the past of 'ryavarta,

from the petty emotions of su!!ess and applause and from !ommer!ialism. )einstate the

singer in his or her dignity as the arouser of spiritual for!es. /hereafter odily purifi!ation

will follow and the dis!arding of all harmoniums whi!h are li#e !an!erous growths in the

ody of (indu, musi!. /hese harmoniums are truly symoli!. In 4urope or 'meri!a,

instruments of the type whi!h is found in India are seen pra!ti!ally nowhere save at !heap

out:of:door religious meetings, espe!ially those of the alvation 'rmy, an amaing produ!t

of the 'nglo:a&on ra!e, and in motion pi!ture studios for the sa#e of !onvenien!e. -et

4uropean mer!hants are finding pleasure and wealth in dumping these vile produ!ts into

India, as they have dumped al!ohol into all !ountries to whi!h they rought the lessings of

so:!alled ?!iviliation.?

/he important point however is not that "ren!h or Eerman traders dis!overed su!h a sad

way of ma#ing money, ut that Indian musi!ians have een lind, or rather deaf enough


13/72

mentally if not sensorially to tolerate su!h an invasion that they have so !ompletely lost

the deeper sense of musi!, of the magi! of sound and rags, as to wel!ome the hideous and

false intonations of harmoniums. Herily the need for purifi!ation is from within, not from

without. 8ar(awor#s in mysterious ways. 8ho #nows how far (indu musi!ians were

responsile many !enturies ago for the perversion of Eree# Pythagorean musi! or of anyother stream of musi! then moving westward. 'nd now the oomerang !omes a!# to him

who pro+e!ted it first. /he impure seed of long ago rings its long delayed fruit. /he spiritual

failures of the past are neutralied y the degeneres!en!e of today. /he reformation

therefore must needs first e !omplete purifi!ation.

/here is only one true purifierC spiritual #nowledge. /he reformation must therefore e a

reformation y #nowledge ut not the #nowledge of re!ipes given y someody to

someone else, not even that whi!h is ased on merely repeating a!!urately what one has

heard without #nowing the why or the wherefore of the utteran!es or of the song. 8hat the

Indian musi!ian needs today more than anything else is the #nowledge of the

funda(entals of Tone and Sound, of the true s!ien!e of sound and the true philosophy

of musi!. /his will in time lead to the #nowledge of the instrumentC the human ody in

relation to the deeper aspe!ts of tone produ!tion, if to the study of the laws of matter or

sustan!e is added the !on!entration upon the pirit, upon Ishwaradwelling in the human

heart, the fountainhead of all human tones.

A 4ditor3s oteC /his was written in 1926, efore the word ?'ryan? was aused in the 19=>s

and 197>s. /he word ?'ryan? is of an!ient origin. It is used here in referen!e to an!ient

Indian tradition, espe!ially that of north India ;?'ryavarta?


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Cha+ter Two

Living Tones or Intellectual otes

Ever) co(+le organis( is (ade u+ of a (ultitude of units, a human ody of !ells of

various types, the universe of solar systems of various orders. /he many units !onsidered

as a whole form the sustan!e of the organism. /he same is true of musi!. 4very ra!e or

every great ra!ial !y!le witnesses the growth, maturity and de!ay of a !ertain musi!al

!ulture or musi!ality, whi!h is in every way similar to an organism that is, it has a !ertain

sustan!e and an animating pirit or soul. /he soul of the old 'ryan or hinese or 4uropean

musi!alities is an aspe!t of the )a!e:oul evolving during these periods, an aspe!t of the

'ryan or hinese or 4uropean !iviliation. Philosophers and musi!ians have at times

spe!ulated aout them. But very few are those who have !on!entrated upon the substance

of the various musi!alities, upon the units or !ells of the ody of this or that musi!. Be!ause

many have failed to understand the spe!ifi! !hara!ter of the musi!al sustan!e, they have

een led into mis!on!eptions or superfi!ial spe!ulations as to the pirit of the musi!al!ulture fun!tioning through su!h a sustan!e.

/o put it in simpler language we spea# aout symphonies or !horal wor#s or !y!les of

(indu melodies we !ontemplate the inspiration whi!h produ!ed them, the spiritual power in

the individual !omposer or in the ra!e whi!h manifested through the wor#s, ut we do not

give mu!h thought to the musi!al units of whi!h these wor#s are !onstituted. 8e almost

ta#e it for granted that these units are sounds used either in melodi! su!!ession or

simultaneously in harmoni! and polyphoni! !ominations. 8e do not realie that there are

sounds and sounds, as there are individuals and individuals that e&a!tly as a so!iety fails or

triumphs upon the merit of the human individuals who !ompose it, so a musi!al wor#.

4astern or 8estern, is ultimately what its units are, whether we !all these units musi!al

notes as in the 8est, or l)usin hina, or swaras, sursor whatnot in India.

But, one may o+e!t, is not the sound produ!ed y a string instrument of the violin type for

instan!e the same whether you !all it $oor Sa, whether played y a 4uropean or a (indu

musi!ianG /o whi!h we will answerC what do you mean y eing the sameG 're an

un!ultivated peasant and a real yogi the same thing e!ause oth odies appear somewhat

ali#e in feature and general ethni! typeG 8as Drishna the same as any plain shepherd oyG

-ou !all Drishna an avatar, a manifestation of the upreme pirit. But for the an!ient (indu

musi!ians, and still for a few living ones apparently, the tones they uttered or produ!ed

were also avatars of !osmi! deities or for!es of ature. 8estern intelle!ts usually s!orn su!hideasC for them a sound is the result of the impa!t of air virations upon the ear. $viously

it is that, and in many !ases indeed nothing ut that yet potentially every sound is a tone,

as every human $rganism is a god in!arnate and not only a mass of !ells, of tissues and

ones, more or less adly managed y a rain:orn intelle!t.

But what do 4uropean theorists #now aout a soundG early nothing. /hey see that

something o!!urs in the air, when you hit a gong and they !an tra!e and follow the


15/72

disturan!e thus !aused until it rea!hes the ear and the hearer noti!es a sound. /he only

thing they !an analye is this disturan!e of air ut, as we shall see later, they are at a loss

to e&plain what ta#es pla!e when instead of air the sound travels through amass of metal of

any length. 's for the sound itself, it does not really e&ist for them. (ardly does it e&ist

either for the ma+ority of !omposers or hearers.' single sound has very little meaning for most 8esterners. 'll that they may say of it is

that it has a lovely uality or that it is harsh, pleasing to the ear or displeasing. But what

really matters to them, and to a vast numer of (indu musi!ians as well we must add, is

only the relationship etween this sound and other sounds, in other words a !ertain

seuen!e or group of sounds. Musi! is often !alled the art of ordering sounds. But while

mu!h attention is given to the pro!ess of ordering, hardly any stress is laid today upon the

sounds themselves, their nature and their inherent power. 4uropean musi! has gone so far

in this dire!tion, impelled y various fa!tors ne!essary to its development, as to have

e!ome a sort of applied algera that is, a series of formulas and euations, the terms of

whi!h, the musi!al notes and s!ales, are !onsidered as mere astra!tions almost totally

devoid of the living uality of tone, whi!h is resonan!e.

's a matter of fa!t, 4uropean musi! went one step further. It pra!ti!ally ignored sounds

altogether, and !onsidered only the relationship etween sounds. It !eased to e a musi! of

intervals, therefore a !omination of astra!t patterns % a de!orative art, li#e the art of rug

weaving or tapestry. /he 4uropean notes of musi! are merely the edges of intervals. /hey

have in theory hardly any sustan!e at allC they are e&a!tly li#e mathemati!al points whi!h

have no dimension and therefore are mere astra!tions. It is true the musi!ian #nows that a

sound will e produ!ed !orresponding to the note, ut the mathemati!ian also #nows that a

point hasdimensions on paper, that every point or line is a surfa!e. -et he does not thin#of it as a surfa!e, ut as a point. 5i#ewise the polyphonist of 4urope, espe!ially during the

period of s!holasti!ism in the fourteenth and fifteenth !enturies, does not thin# of musi!al

notes as tones whi!h are entities of a !ertain !hara!ter and pit!h ut only as dots in series.

/he shapes of the seuen!es of dots, what they !all melody ut what in fa!t is only a series

of arupt +umps from dot to dot, are the main thing.

Musi! of patterns, I said therefore 8estern musi! is essentially an art of spa!e, not of time

an art ased on geometri!al prin!iples and not on the o!!ult s!ien!e of numers, numers

whi!h are not merely spe!ulative !on!epts ut living realities of the world of pure energy,

monads in themselves. In 4urope however this geometry of musi!, whi!h is one of the two

great aspe!ts of musi!, has een !on!eived e&a!tly as geometry has een understoodC from

a purely intelle!tual point of view. In ar!hai! times the geometry taught in the san!tuaries,

and also y Pythagoras, was another thing altogether e&a!tly as the Pythagorean monad

was different from the numer 1 of modern arithmeti!. It was one of the deepest #eys to

the mysteries of 5ife and had to do with the surveying and par!eling of pa!e % spa!e

eing no mere emptiness as now !on!eived ut the very fullness of eing, what the Enosti!s

!alled the Pleroma. $n su!h a #ind of mysti! geometry of 5ife the true and yet unrevealed


16/72

musi! of the 8est will some day e founded. $ur 4uropean musi! is nothing of the sort, it is

the mere shadow of su!h an ideal reality and it is so e!ause its units, the musi!al notes,

have no meaning in themselves, are spiritually and in !lassi!al times even emotionally dead.

/a#e a note B for instan!e. It !an e anything. It has no pit!h in itself. It !an e a low B or

a high B any instrument !an produ!e it and in all !ases it will still remain B. Moreover ta#ea wor# of musi!, transpose it a third higher, and few people will noti!e the differen!e even

if they do, they will not !onsider that the musi! has !hanged, for B will retain its pe!uliar

relationship to the notes whi!h !ame efore and after the pattern of the musi! will not have

een altered in any way % any more than that of a rug !hanges whether you hang it on a

high wall or a low wall.

In other words B as a musi!al note has no definite !onne!tion with any parti!ular sound or

pit!h it has not even any symoli!al meaning, either in relation to the performer or to some

general !osmi! harmony. It has no relation to anything save to the other astra!t notes

pre!eding or following it or eing produ!ed at the same time. 4uropean musi! proper is a

musi! the a!tual sound of whi!h matters little, and in some !ases not at all a musi! of

intelle!tual, empiri!al proportions. ' proportion etween whatG 'n interval etween whatG

/he answer is a se!ondary matter. It may e one thing or the other. /herefore it !annot e

anything living.

'ny living organism has a !ertain #ey:viration of its own whi!h may perhaps raise or lower

itself under !ertain unusual !onditions, ut the idea of ?transposing? the atomi! virations of

a !at a fifth higher would !ertainly appear singular. 8ould the !at still remain a !atG $ne

might answerC who would noti!e it if the entire universe were #eyed up in the same

mannerG 8hi!h may or may not e a satisfa!tory answer, a!!ording as one elieves in a

metaphysi!al system or another. But mar# this wellC when a 4uropean musi!ian transposesa musi!al wor# indifferently a third or fifth higher, he does not transpose hi(selfa third or

fifth higher whi!h proves !on!lusively that he does not thin# or feel musi! in terms of life,

in terms of su+e!tive, sonorous e&perien!e, ut as an o+e!tive pattern whi!h !an e

shifted around at will. /he musi!ian may rea!t sensorially and emotionally to it ut, and

here is the important point, he will rea!t to it as to a for(, not as a living energy, not as to

a soul.

4uropean musi! is an ar!hite!toni! of sound, a y:produ!t of ar!hite!ture. Its notes are li#e

stones its stru!ture is symmetri!al and rigid li#e a "ren!h garden of the seventeenth

!entury. It is 'ristotelean and s!holasti!, rational, alan!ed, well proportioned, ut not

alive. Its notes have no individual power of life. /hey do not grow into a fuller life, nor

multiply themselves into se!ondary sounds. /hey are !ut and dried figures, ro!#s. /he

melody does not flow etween those ro!#s, ut +umps me!hanisti!ally from the one to the

other, fearful lest it should fall into the dar# ayss of ?wrong notes?.

"or etween 4uropean notes there is ut musi!al emptiness. 8hereas (indu melodies glide

etween tones whi!h are li#e pulsating hearts, 4uropean melodies follow the motion of a

man3s wal#, whi!h is essentially a su!!ession of arrested falls. /here is no !ontinuity to e


17/72

found, only automatism. Melodies do not grow li#e trees, or flow li#e the lood uniting the

!ells and organs of the ody. /here is no !ir!ulation of sound, no flesh only a s#eleton.

4uropean musi! is li#e an :ray photograph. It shows only ones. It is a musi! of holes,

some larger, some smaller, yet all eually empty, li#e are rooms where no one is living %

soulless, as far as its sustan!e is !on!erned at any rate. Mind ere!ted the ma+esti! walls ofits stru!tures, ut no woman !ame to dwell therein and to transfigure the emptiness of its

holes into a home effulgent with love. 't one time the stru!ture shone with some inner and

!alm light as if it were some great !onvent filled with !ells physi!ally are in their austerity

yet devotionally alive % at the time of Palestrina, Hittoria ut this was only for a short

while, a foreshadowing of the greater realiations of a future !iviliation when religion will

not soothe and appease, ut rather transfigure man into a living god.

' sensorial intelle!t transfigured into a divine mind a ta(asicor ra9asicpersonality

transformed into a living god a 4uropean note of musi! transmuted into a real swarain

whi!h dwelleth Ishwara, the elf, or from whi!h at least radiates the power of 8ill,

Ichcha, of some !osmi! Intelligen!e % these are asi!ally one and the same pro!ess. But

how many modern (indu singers #now the mystery of /oneG

A tone is a living cell. It is !omposed of organi! matter. It has the power of assimilation,

of reprodu!tion, of ma#ing e&!hanges, of growing. It is a mi!ro!osmos refle!ting faithfully

the ma!ro!osmos, its laws, its !y!les, its !entre. on!entrate on a !ell, and the mysteries of

the universe may e revealed to you therein. on!entrate on a tone, and in it you may

dis!over the se!ret of eing and find Ishwara, the hrist within. ' tone is a solar system. It

is !omposed, as we will see later, of a !entral sun, of planets, and of a magneti! sustan!e

whi!h !ir!ulates rhythmi!ally within the limits of the system and relates itself to themagneti! sustan!e of some vaster system. Be!ause of this, a tone is not a mere

mathemati!al point without dimensions or density, ut it is a living reality, a sound. It is

defined y various sets of !hara!teristi!s, pit!h and uality eing only the outer one. It is

situated in time and spa!e, related to the entire universe, affe!ted y season, day, hour, y

the magneti! !ondition of the solar system at the time it is orn ;i.e., produ!ed y the

musi!ian


18/72

to an animal spe!ies, as we shall see presently. 'll these !orresponden!es % if the ar!hai!

and true ones are !onsidered and not, as usual, their various perverted sustitutes % were

real they were ased on the #nowledge of !osmi! laws, on the laws of tone and sound, as

well as of the o!!ult physiologi!al nature of the human ody.

/hese !osmi! !orresponden!es are not to e found only in India as every one #nows. Inhina, musi! was uilt also on real tones ut these were somewhat different from (indu

tones or at least they e!ame so after the musi!al reformation whi!h too# pla!e around the

third !entury B.. and after whi!h we see the !lassi!al system of the C)cle of L)usfully

operative. 4a!h of these twelve lyus had a definite !osmi! signifi!an!e and was related to

modifi!ations of the two great prin!iples, )angand )in, positive and negative, mas!uline

and feminine as also to seasons, months, days, hours, et!. But hinese musi! was founded

upon the prin!iple of duality and most proaly was the out!ome of a dire!t Pythagorean

influen!e, whereas 'ryan:(indu musi! rests upon the prin!iple of unity, of the elf sound

or tone eing the power, or sa4ti, of the elf, i.e., Swa5ra, raeing always !onne!ted with

the !reative power of 8ill or !osmi! desire.

But even 8estern musi! originally #new of su!h !osmi! !orresponden!es and had its real

modes, very mu!h similar to the hinese in their origin and fun!tion, and essentially ased

on spiritual 'l!hemy. It was so at least in yrian musi! whi!h is the very sour!e of all

hristian mediaeval hymns and !hants.

$ne of the greatest minds of yria, Bar:(eraeus, a man of en!y!lopaedi!al #nowledge and

great power who lived during the thirteenth !entury, in his oo# Ethicon;?$n the natural

!ause of modes?< states that all e!!lesiasti!al modes were uilt at first upon the various

!ominations of the ?four ualities whi!h areC !old, hot, humid, dry?. By relating these four

ualities two y two we get four dualities ut y !onsidering that in ea!h duality one of theelements predominates in turn, we get eight modes % the original eight modes of plain

!hant. If moreover we add to these, four more !ominations in whi!h the two elements are

perfe!tly alan!ed we get in all twelve modes, whi!h Bar:(eraeus tells us were used y

the ?Persian musi!ians? ;proaly of the old Magian:haldean tradition


19/72

musi!ians. 5a!# of #nowledge and desire for personal fame rought degenera!y in all

epo!hs and in all lands. hristian musi! e!ame degraded with hristian tea!hings in

general. Its !osmi!, al!hemi!al foundation eing destroyed, it soon grew more and more

intelle!tual and sensorially inspired, till tones of power e!ame mere musi!al notes, as the

magi!al in!antations of old were turned into empty formulas repeated me!hani!ally y anignorant priesthood, with very few e&!eptions.

(ere again we !ome against this duality of #nowledge and selflessness. 8here #nowledge is

la!#ing and amition or vanity prevails degeneration ne!essarily sets in. Musi! falls into the

personal art of ordering in stri#ing, pleasant and original ways devitalied tones % very

mu!h in the way in whi!h the art of !oo#ing is today ased on !ominations of devitalied

food produ!ts. /he toni! power of food is lost as well as the toni! power of sounds. In order

to have foods, whi!h !an e used at any time, in and out of season, whi!h !an e indulged

in aundantly, whi!h ti!#le the sense of taste, the wholesale denaturation of !ereals, of

fruits, of vegetales, ta#es pla!e, and meat is served to !oarsened appetites % as well as

strident and latant rass ands whi!h delight not only 8estern patriots !elerating wars

and festivities, ut also 4astern potentates. Purifi!ation means to free one3s aestheti! or

physi!al diet from su!h perversions, to go a!# to ature and ature3s laws % metaphysi!al

as well as physi!al ature. )egeneration means that the toni! power of that whi!h feeds the

spiritual, moral and physi!al nature of man is asored, so that the elf and life may sing

again in the tones we hear and in the things we eat, or read, or love % in all that we

assimilate, in all, therefore, that we e!ome ?similar to?.

/o get at the toni! power in all that !omes out of us as well as in all that we put into our

ody ;physi!al, emotional or mental< % this is what has een !alled S)ntonis(. $n the

re!eptive side yntonism deals with "ood in the most universal sense of the term, that iswith the law of assimilationC what you assimilate so you e!ome. $n the !reative side the

yntoni! )eformation finds its most patent and most symoli!al manifestation in a

regeneration of musi!, oth 4astern and 8estern, for the one is the !omplement of the

other. Musi! must regain the toni! power whi!h it has lost, or of whi!h it #nows ut a

materialisti! emotional shadow and this !an e attained only y means of self purifi!ation

and #nowledge % very mu!h what Mahatma Eandhi means y Sat)agraha, it we

understand him aright % the self:purifying effort toward /ruth, the truth of one3s own

selfhood, the tone of one3s own eing.

"or the !entre of the yntoni! )eformation is the individual in the realm of musi!, the

musi!ian. 8hat musi!ians of old lost y la!# of suffi!ient #nowledge and e!ause ?they have

desired to attain fame,? musi!ians of today must regain y real and selfless study, y a life:

!on!entration of /one, on ?Ishwara, the Master, whose magi! power !auseth all things and

!reatures to revolve mounted upon the universal wheel of time?. $n these famous words of

the 3hagavad5'itais founded the entire reformation of musi! whi!h the world needs

today. "or Ishwarais /one (is magi! power is what we !alled 3toni! power3 in all things

and in all types of musi! whi!h are real. 's we understand the revolutions of the 3universal


20/72

wheel of time,3 that is of the !y!les of 5ife and lives, we at the same time master the laws of

musi!al !omposition. 8e e!ome ale to produ!e tone:organisms whi!h are truly organi!

and vital, whose toni! power may regenerate our fellowmen and rouse in them the fire. In

other words we shall #now how to !all down Ishwarainto our songs y the magi! of the

lost 'andhara 'ra(aand how to #indle in others the flame of spiritual regeneration ythe power of the rag $i+a4, also lost.

8nowledge of the laws of sound:purifi!ation through union with the oul of the ar!hai!

'ryan musi!, !on!entration on the /one within. /hese are the three paths to the musi!al

regeneration of India, and of the world. $nly while the oul of musi! may mean to the

(indu, arada, to the 8esterner it means rather Pythagoras, the "ather of 8estern

!iviliation.

5et us ta#e at first the !ase, very simple yet very vast in its impli!ations, of the artisans of

old, and even of today in some pla!es, who spent years !asting and fashioning some temple

gong so that the tone of the gong might e a revelation to all the devotees who would hear

it filling the holy spa!es. In old 4urope, li#ewise, we hear of ell:ma#ers foiling in love and

devotion to produ!e the ell that would toll and resound over towns and fields. 8hat made

su!h gongs or ells the living things they really wereG 8hat gave them the power to e&alt

the humle farmers, to !on+ure up visions and e!stasy in a Joan of 'r!, to rouse in all the

sense of the *ivine, not of a far off *ivine ut the spiritual sense of Eod dwelling in dawns,

noons, sunsets, smiling in the daily laor of all menG It was #nowledge first, the #nowledge

of the e&a!t proportion of metals to e melted, of those shapes, whi!h would. 8esterners

would say, give out the est a!ousti!al resonan!e, some (indus would say, harmonie

themselves perfe!tly to the ar!hetypal form of the life of the devawho was to in!arnateinto the tones. It was #nowledge, ut also the pro+e!tion of spiritual devotion into the wor#,

the magnetiing of the metals y human will and love, the !on!entration upon the messages

perhaps whi!h the ell or gong would ring to human souls. imple and naKve possily as

the faith of the artisans might have een, yet a real faith % li#e that of the !arvers of the

thousands of Buddhas in ro!#s, in woods, in temples, all very mu!h ali#e some people say,

all very marvellously selfless we would answer, prayers of wor#, the only true prayers.

8hy did we mention gongs and ellsG Be!ause in a sense they represent an aspe!t of the

highest and most spiritual musi!, that of single toneswhi!h are one and many, whi!h

thro and live, whi!h are at times the perfe!t dynami! odies of !elestial entities, the

cha4rasof the *eity. ingle living tones $f these there are really two #indsC those uttered

y the human eing, audily or inaudily, the 'FM of ea!h eing and those produ!ed y

gongs and ells !ast a!!ording to hierati! forms.

's the tone of the individual eing is one and many, so the tone of a gong is one and many.

/ou!h it lightly at the !enter, then farther, farther away until you rea!h the outer edge. -ou

hear an infinite gradation of su:tones usually within the limit of a fifth or fourth ;Sa5Paor

Sa5%a< all of whi!h !on!ur to form the !ompound tone of the gong. In other words you


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have a great hierati! rotherhood of tones, ea!h tone an individual eing yet all ound in a

perfe!t metalli! solidarity, all lending their voi!es into the great tone:entity, the ada,

heard when the !enter is stru!#. In a single lone you have a !omplete organi! symphony.

u!h a tone is the eginning and end of musi!, the seed of all musi!.

(ow !ould a singer produ!e su!h living tones unless indeed he himself had e!ome a singleliving tone, unless he had unified to some e&tent the multitudinous !ries of his lives, !ells

and organs into a great, full and virant toneG 'll songs to e real, from the old 'ryan point

of view, must e ased upon the one fundamental resonan!e of the singer himself or

herself all swarasmust e grasped as modifi!ations, a!!ording to the !y!li!

transformations of ature within as without, of the Ishwarain the heart.

But how !an su!h a resonan!e e produ!ed if not in the same way in whi!h the gong ma#er

fashions his gongG /he proper human and emotional metals or sustan!es must e lended

in !orre!t proportion, then all melted in the great sea of fire within further, the inner Body

must ta#e its ar!hetypal form !al!ulated so that the tone, ada, may resound with full

power, that is, as a !omplete synthesis of all the little sutones of the rotherhood of the

Body. /hus we realie the need of a very definite al!hemi!al pro!ess at the sour!e of all

living tones. 8e may understand what one should mean y the phrase, the 'l!hemy of

Musi!. 4uropean !ulture degraded this !on!eption and elieved that musi!al al!hemy was

merely the proper mi&ture of notes in the form of !hords and symphoni! !ominations.

/oday 8estern musi!ians are all hypnotied y the ideal of or!hestral al!hemy, y the

sear!h for new !ominations of instruments and solving prolems of or!hestral te!hniue

seems to many the supreme tas# of modern musi!. But that is ut the o+e!tive

materialisti! shadow of the true al!hemy of tone whi!h ta#es pla!e not without, in a group

of instrumentalists who are playing musi! as a usiness in a me!hani!al and soulless wayfrom a printed s!ore whi!h tells them all what to do, ut within the singer himself. /one:

al!hemy is not soul:al!hemy, for tone and soul are one. If tone and soul are not one, then

we have no real tones, ut mere musi!al notes, sonorous shells.

Alche() (eans +urification. It rests upon a asis of ethi!s. /ones must therefore e

livedy the individual musi!ian, espe!ially y the singer, whose ody is the very

instrument wherein the tones are generated. orre!t intonation, asolute pit!h, ought to e

understood in terms of life, in terms of firmness, !orre!tness and steadiness of !hara!ter.

8here instruments of fi&ed pit!h are used, there !annot e heard the real 'ryan musi!

whi!h is ased on self:intonation and the power of the individual soul. 'ryan musi! is not

!osmi! musi!, as in hina of old, nor is it group musi!, !ommunal musi!, as in the 8est. It

is the musi! of the individual soul, of Ishwara in every eing. 4a!h singer must find

therefore, his or her own fundamental, or Sa, and tune the ta(buraa!!ordingly. (appy

those whose fundamental is the tone of ature

5i#ewise the use of a musi!al s!ore, as 4urope understands it, !an ut ring aout the

degeneration of (indu musi!, for it transfers the dynami! !enter of musi! from the living


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individual eing to dead intelle!tual formulas. ' musi!al s!ore is nothing more than a dead

intelle!tual formula, if it pretends to indi!ate to the instrumentalist the very minute gestures

and infle&ions whi!h he must perform. It !an only e used in a !ulture where musi! is ased

on astra!t patterns and not on living tones, where it is !onsidered as something o+e!tive,

and not as a su+e!tive e&perien!e.8estern musi!ians today are worshipping musi!al s!ores, little patterns of la!# dots on

paper, as 8estern !iviliation in general is worshipping other little printed pie!es of paper.

's dollar ills represent no a!tual wealth ut !redit ased on trust, so the musi!al s!ore is

not really musi! ut represents only the trust that its signs will eventually turn out to e

sounds whi!h you !an hear, therefore musi!. ' s!ore is li#e an ar!hite!tural plan whi!h may

materialie into a uilding some day, ut whi!h has no life:value in itself. If it has an

immediate life:value it is as a drawing perhaps, ut not musi!, for musi! whi!h is not

actuall)heard, either y the physi!al or the spiritual ears is no musi!. Musi!ians tell you

they hear a s!ore y loo#ing at it. But they really do not. /hey re(e(berasso!iations of

sounds y means of a rain pro!ess whi!h relates !ertain signs to the memory of auditory

sensations. 'nd if su!h a rememran!e seems to them as real as a!tual hearing, then it

means only that they do not #now what true hearing is, what a tone e&perien!e is % and

many indeed do not.

-et 8estern musi! y virtue of its astra!tness and its la!# of !onne!tion with real sounds is

in fa!t well represented y a s!ore. /he s!ore faithfully re!ords the patterns, and

supplementary mar#s indi!ate the personal will of the !omposer. ' musi!al wor# eing

essentially an o+e!tive thing, the !omposer, as a musi!al artisan, fashions it on!e for all. If

you !arve a ri!e owl out of a eautiful tree and give it to a friend telling him that it is a ri!e

owl, the properties and use of the o+e!t are settled on!e for all. If you had made a !orre!tdrawing of it, indi!ated the #ind of wood whi!h had to e !hosen and the way it had to e

used, the plan or des!ription thus given would have entirely defined the o+e!t. ' musi!al

s!ore in 4urope is e&a!tly this #ind of des!ription. /he !omposer tells everything whi!h must

e done, as the author and owner of the musi!al o+e!t, and either the performer follows his

instru!tions and the musi!al o+e!t is well produ!ed, or he does things whi!h he was not

told to do and the musi!al o+e!t is !onsidered imperfe!t. /he performer is thus nothing

more than a me!hani!. /he musi! produ!ed has really nothing to do with his own self. /he

more he e!omes suservient to the auto!rati! will of the !omposer % who yet is ut a

!on!eiver and not an a!tualier % the etter is his +o done. o wonder that

instrumentalists lose all initiative and e!ome mere ma!hines "or they are !hained to the

s!ore and its in+un!tions, as slaves to the oars of some an!ient galley.

u!h an attitude has e!ome definite to this e&tent only in re!ent years. ' !ouple of

!enturies ago in 4urope the s!ore was not the greedy monster it has e!ome now. Musi!

e!oming more and more popularied and in!reasingly !omple&, the need was felt for a still

more asolute impersonaliation of performan!es, and the pro!ess !ulminated in me!hani!al

reprodu!ing instruments, in whi!h the human euation is totally asent from the rendition


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of the musi!al wor#. Musi!al wor4s, truly they are, for 8estern musi! is ased only on

doing and not on eing, li#e the entire 8estern !iviliation. It !onveys the ideal of mental or

emotional a!tivity, of matter mastered, of multipli!ity painsta#ingly resolved into a sort of

!horal harmony. It is not something heard within ut something done without. In a very

definite manner, the !omposer is li#e an artisan, a gong ma#er, toiling at the !asting andeating of the gong. But in the 8est, the gong is made up of human !ellsC it is a vast !hoir

of men and women singing, lowing, owing, hittingC it is the entire or!hestra, the ever

elusive mass of sonorous sustan!e to e !ast anew for ea!h performan!e a!!ording to the

formula given y the !omposer:al!hemist, the s!ore, under the dire!tion of the toiling leader

eating the air with his magi! wand as if he were hammering sounds.

/he 8estern or!hestra as a supreme gong ut that is only the future. "or a gong is a

perfe!t rotherhood of tones perfe!tly united and lended, as a vehi!le, or vahan, for some

!osmi! entity. In it the law of !ohesion manifests fully. It is a mass of atoms and mole!ulesC

it is a host of tones, of !osmi! lives. It is a !on!entri! and organi! ody, through whi!h the

energy of sound flows uninterrupted and, in some !ases at least, it has not only an

elemental soul orn out of this !ohesive prin!iple, ut a spiritual soul as well rought down

into its mass y the !on!entrated devotion of its ma#er.

/he ig modern or!hestras are far, very far indeed, from fulfilling all su!h reuirements.

/hey have e!ome wonders of intelle!tual and te!hni!al aility. Instrumentalists have

e!ome perfe!t ma!hines under the dire!tion of master !raftsmen. 8hat is produ!ed is a

eautiful o+e!t eautiful ut usually only a gorgeous ody, without a spiritual soul. Is it

even a odyG (ardly so, e!ause it has no unity, or very little of it. /he sonorous sustan!e

does not flow !onsistentlyC neither melodi!ally nor harmoni!ally. 8estern !omposers have

not yet fully learnt how to produ!e an organi! ody of sounds, though 8agner and a fewre!ent !omposers have !ome very near it, espe!ially !riain. /hey will hardly ever attain to

su!h a mastery of sonorous metallurgy as long as 8estern melodies are series of +umps

from note to note with sonorous emptiness in etween, as long as they will not use as a

foundation to the or!hestral stru!ture, instruments with sustained resonan!e, li#e gongs,

ells, et!., or even li#e groups of pianos or harps.

4ven so, this would only ma#e of the or!hestra a perfe!t ody with an elemental soul it

would not give to the musi! a spiritual soul. In order to give a soul, one must e first a soul.

/he (anasa+utrasrought (anasto the human )a!e only e!ause they were perfe!t

(anasasthemselves. /ones e!ome alive in the musi! produ!ed only as the musi!ian3s

tone rings them its own spiritual fire. /ones are #indled in every sound uttered y the

?toneful? eing. /hus Ishwara3s ?magi! power !auseth all things and !reatures to revolve

mounted upon the universal wheel of time?. /his universal wheel is the great Eong of the

universe, the %ahacha4raof the !osmos. 5ife !ir!ulates within it when its !enter is stru!#

y the magi! power of Ishwara.

But every man has within himself a repli!a, an image of this (ahacha4rawhi!h is li#e the

fiery wheel des!ried y the (erew prophet in the Bile. 8hat lights the fire and sets the


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wheel alae and rotatingG %anas, the individual soul, refle!ting the universal pirit, At(a.

%anas, as said in (indu oo#s, emanates a ray whi!h stri#es at the seat of the odily fire

and sets the reath a:whirling through the various !enters of tone:produ!tion. /his reath

or (arutais what I will !all 3sonal energy3. Passing through the musi!al organ of the

magneti! ody of man and its nadis, it produ!es nadaor tone./hus tone is e&perien!ed within and tones !an e e&perien!ed only within, whether orn

dire!tly of the inner self or pro+e!ted y the Ishwari! will of the musi!ian adept. 8e hear

sounds with our ears we read musi!al s!ore with our eyes we e&perien!e tones with our

heart. /hus originate the great types of musi!C sensorial, intelle!tual, spiritual or in general

philosophi! termsC materialism, the eye do!trine, the (eart do!trine %sensualism or

animalism, selfishness, divine !ompassion.

(indu musi!ians should realie these divisions they should aove all understand that there

are two #inds of musi!al #nowledgeC eye #nowledge and ear #nowledge. 8hile they have

een on the whole saved from the evils of the former #ind whi!h has intelle!tualied and

devitalied 4uropean musi!, they have ut too often stopped at mere ear #nowledge and

forgotten that su!h is to e ut the prelude to (eart realiations nay more, they have even

allowed the ear #nowledge of the srutisto e!ome perverted. 's the twenty:two srutisare

no longer !orre!tly per!eived, the twenty:two nadisare no longer fun!tioning and nadais

no longer e&perien!ed. /he divine revelation within, the true Heda, is lost.

Musi! as tone e&perien!e. /his is the fundamental do!trine, the !enter, of the yntoni!

)eformation. /he 8estern world has forgotten tones and worships at the intelle!tual shrine

of musi!al notes whi!h !ompose the intri!ate patterns of the musi!al s!ore. /he greatest

part of the Indian world ut faintly rememers tones and repeats almost without real

understanding traditional songs, more and more degenerating from !onta!t with 8estern!iviliation and its deadly weapon, the harmonium.

/he yntoni! )eformation !an !ome only from withinC y purifi!ation from adhar(aand

the return to the true dhar(aof (indu musi! fundamentally different from that of 8estern

musi! y #nowledge of the laws of sound as of the laws of elf y fervent devotion to the

Ishwarawithin. "rom the #nowledge of the laws of sa4ti, from real bha4tiwhi!h alone

ma#es this #nowledge true and spiritual, is orn the !reative power within the heart, ra4ti,

the magi! power of living tones.


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Cha+ter Three

Seeds of Sound

In ancient Ar)an boo4s we find (an) s)(bolical references to seedswith the aim of

!onveying to the student y the method of analogy great truths !on!erning the origin of all

things, of all !y!les. 's we have seen already, the philosophi!al !on!ept of seed is

ne!essarily ound to that of !y!le. /here is no !y!le whi!h has not a seed there is no

manifested life whi!h did not originate in some sort of a seed, that is to say from an initial

mass of sustan!e having in itself the potentiality of all future developments, e it !alled

egg or seed or whatnot.

It is said that in the seed of the lotus a perfe!t though infinitely small model of the full

grown plant is to e seen. /he lotus !y!le is found already !ompleted within the prote!tive

walls of the seed. Erowth will mean merely the !oming forth of the full potentiality into a

!ompleted a!tuality, with the !han!e, however, that e!ause of adverse !onditions

;improper soil or !limate or !are< the development of the potential into the a!tual maye!ome hindered, the growth stunted, and the manifested type inferior to the prototypi!al

model within the seed.

But we have not only the manifested type, or plant, and the prototype in the seed we must

re!ognie also the e&isten!e of a spiritual ar!hetype whi!h in itself is the refle!tion of a mere

astra!t formula of relationship etween spe!ifi! !hara!teristi!s. 4very vegetale spe!ies is

defined y a set of !ertain !hara!teristi!s as to its form, !olor, modality of growth, et! we

!ould redu!e all these into a !ertain !omple& formula whi!h would e the astra!t reality of

the spe!ies, one spe!ial thought of Brahma let us say. /he reator has a thought this

thought produ!es an astra!t form this is an ar!hetype. /he ar!hetypal form of the lotus is

this image in the osmi! Mind whi!h is the ideal plan of all lotus plants, the mental layout of

the set of spe!ifi! !hara!teristi!s thought of y the reator.

/he ne&t !reative operation is the pro+e!tion of the thought:image into a !ertain mass of

sustan!e, of +ra4riti, spe!ially fitted to re!eive it. ustan!e had een evolving in its own

way while the thought image was produ!ed in the mind of Brahma. 8hen the sustan!e is

ready to re!eive the thought image, Brahma y means of a twofold yet single, a!t of energy

;y the use of ichchasa4tior will, and of 4ri)asa4tior image pro+e!tion< shoots a ray of

itself into matter ;as ara)ana


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;what I !alled 3sonal energy3< are fulfilling somewhat analogi!al fun!tions. /his sonal energy,

as we shall see presently, manifests in several modes. It !an e either des!ending or

as!ending energy.

3ut before we stud) these various (odalities of sonal energ) we must give moreattention to the single tone and first to the a!t of instrumental tone:produ!tion. In a general

and philosophi!al sense every tone originates in the setting in viration of an instrument, e

this instrument !osmi!, animal or man:made. 8e saw that the instrument ;the vahanof

the tone< !ould e !ompared to the wom of tones, to the matri& of spa!e or mysti! !haos.

/he instrument must e stru!# in order to produ!e a sound ;either a mere resonan!e or a

fe!undated tone


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!orresponden!es of tones. /o this end we must differentiate at first etween two great

!ategories of tonesC self:e&pressive tones produ!ed y living !reatures, animals and men

and instrumental tones proper.

In order to grasp the meaning of the tones produ!ed y animals, we must first try to

understand what the term ?animal? implies not only in its ovious ut in its fullestphilosophi!al sense. Ani(ain 5atin means reath and soul. Ani(a (undiis the 8orld

oul, the great Mother or 8wan)inin hina, and in a sense 6achor Aditiin the Hedas. 'll

an!ient ra!es had moreover their a!red 'nimals, whi!h were also odia!al signs and gods.

till our physi!al plane animals ar! truly !reatures elow the human ra!e, symols of

instin!tual emotions, of the desires of the flesh and of passions. (ow !an these two

meanings e re!on!iledG 8hy do we use in 4nglish the terms ?animal? and ?animisti!? to

des!rie two ualities apparently oppositeG

It is e!ause oth terms !an e e&plained in terms of another, i.e., ?animation? or

essentially !reative motion. Ani(ameans reath, therefore rhythmi!al motion, therefore

sounds. ound is in ani(a, and the latter is a4ashawhose essential property is sound. 5ife

e&presses itself in many modes. 4very one of these modes materialies into a #ingdom of

life. 4very #ingdom has its own spe!ifi! fun!tion or dhar(a. /he mineral #ingdom

manifests !ohesion and its fun!tion is to provide a asis for the development of higher

types the vegetale #ingdom manifests sensiility and serves as lin# etween the heat and

+ranaof the sun and our earth, as the universal food the animal #ingdom or mode of life

manifests instin!ts and emotions. It provides a asis for the development of the higher

type, man the thin#er that is, for a fully individualied !ons!iousness, also for a life whi!h is

self:moving. It provides instin!tual !ries whi!h are to human songs what instrumental

resonan!es are to spiritually fe!undated tones.In a very real sense the animal life is the matri& of the human line as the mineral life is the

asis of the vegetale life and what the vegetale life is to the animal life, so is the human:

personal life to the higher spiritual modes of life. /he differen!e etween a !rystal and a

plant is that while the former grows within the osom of the earth, the latter grows out of it

and e!omes transfigured y the sun, into the very avatar of the sun3s energy. imilarly the

differen!e etween animals and human personalities is that while the former live within the

psy!hi! wom of ature and are not self:moving ut only ra!ially instin!tively moving, the

latter !an grow out of this psy!hi! wom of ature, e transfigured y the olar Pitrisor

'r!hangels, and e!ome the very avatars of the spiritual un3s power.

/he animal life is thus the instrumental asis of the in!arnation of the human tones. /he

!osmi! Builders and )ulers of the animal spe!ies are truly similar to the instrument:ma#ers

who provide the musi!ian soul with resonan!es, with the ova of the future tones. /hose

uilders are thus form:uilders they are the 5unar Pitris, whose nature is water)while

the olar PitrisLAgnishvattas< are essentially fire. 8ater, as we #now already, is the

lood of the earth. Blood is asi!ally sea 8ater. /he 5unar Pitrisare the pirits in the

lood, therefore the ra!ial 'r!hangels of 8estern religions, the ra!ial gods, the many


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Jehovahs who rouse in the triesmen patriotism, war:li#e emotions, religious fervor who

sound the #ey:notes of ra!es and ra!ial !ultures who, e!ause they rule the lood and the

mus!ular heart, rule instin!ts and instin!tual emotions, therefore the animal nature of men,

and their animal !ries and resonan!es.

$n the !ontrary, the olar Pitrisare the des!ending /ones whi!h in!arnate in the humanresonan!es or personalities and transfigure them into the li#eness of the spiritual

"undamentals. /hey are the mighty udras, the eleven solar spirits, ea!h doule:natured

;nilalohitas, lue and red


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produ!ed the seven fundamental tones, whi!h thus e!ame the seven aspe!ts of the 8orld

oul, seven !enters of !osmi! energy, therefore the tones of the seven a!red Planets,

!onstituting in their totality the Pythagorean musi! of the spheres. /hen a perverted

intelle!tual !iviliation made of them mere lifeless and toneless astra!tions, mere musi!al

notes whi!h are nothing ut !onventional designations, asolutely dis!onne!ted fromanything vital, !on!eived only in terms of the patterns whi!h are made with them on our

depthless rains.

/o e&plain why !ertain fundamentals were !onne!ted with !ertain animal spe!ies, gods and

planets would e a long if not an impossile tas#. /he !orresponden!es given vary with

ra!es and with authors trying to re!ord traditions more or less !orrupted or delierately

veiled. 4very (indu musi!ian may try to find for himself whi!h of these re!ords is true, if

any, and to grasp the se!ret meaning of the !orresponden!es. 's we have seen already, in

a really hu(ansense, these seven fundamentals are not so mu!h tones as !omple& (odes

of resonance, and therefore musi!al modes;#< whi!h e!ame in the !ourse of time

!hara!teried solely y their predominating tone or ha(sa;usually spelt ;a(sa;


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the four seasons< and are thus or seven fundamentals or Portals the latter are !on!eived

espe!ially as a s!ale or sliding ladder ;)un


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is an organi! tone. It is the out!ome of all the fun!tional pro!esses of the planet. It is the

syntheti! resonan!e of the +ra4riti. of our planetary system. $n a still higher level we

would find the syntheti! resonan!e of the entire !osmos, and this too would e the voi!e of

+ra4riti, a tone, single yet multitudinous. -et all these tones, from the ellowing of a !ow

to the universal tone of the manifested universe, !onstitute only the 6ai4hariaspe!t of6ach.

But eyond this manifested universe there is the universe of spiritual energies whi!h

!olle!tively !onstitute the Ani(a (undior 8orld oul, and serially the many elestial

(ierar!hies or (osts personified in all mythologies under the name of this or that god. 4a!h

of these (osts has also its own psy!hi! resonan!e, whi!h is the syntheti! resonan!e of the

rotherhood. /hese !olle!tively !onstitute the %adh)a(aaspe!t of 6ach, !orresponding to

the Su4sh(aform of the universe ;!f. ua )ow3s 5e!tures on the 3hagavad5'ita.

dane rudhyar - the rebirth of hindu music

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