The Role of Sound in Shamanic Practices

Sound plays a crucial role in shamanic practices across various cultures. It is used to facilitate altered states of consciousness, perform healing rituals, and communicate with the spirit world. Sound is regarded as one of the most effective ways of establishing connections with the spirit realm, since it travels through space, permeates visual and physical barriers, and conveys information from the unseen world. Sound, therefore, is a means of "relationship" as well as a "transformation" of energy. Here are the key ways sound is utilized in shamanism:

1. Inducing Altered States of Consciousness

Rhythmic Drumming and Percussion:

• Repetition and Rhythm: Drumming at specific rhythms (typically 4-7 beats per second) can induce trance states. The repetitive, monotonous sound helps to alter brainwave patterns, promoting a shift from normal waking consciousness to a trance state.
• Instruments: Common percussion instruments include drums, rattles, and clappers. Each produces a distinct sound that can affect the practitioner's state of mind.

Vocalizations:

• Chanting and Singing: Shamans use their voices to produce chants, songs, and mantras. These vocalizations can have a calming, focusing effect, aiding in the trance induction.   
• Overtone Singing: Some traditions use overtone or throat singing, which produces multiple pitches simultaneously, creating a complex sound environment conducive to trance.

Ambient Sounds:

• Natural Sounds: Environmental sounds like flowing water, wind, and animal calls are often incorporated into rituals, enhancing the sensory experience and facilitating altered consciousness.

2. Facilitating Communication with the Spirit World

Spiritual Dialogues:

• Invocation and Prayer: Shamans use sound to call upon spirits, deities, or ancestors. These sounds can include specific prayers, chants, or songs that are believed to attract or summon spiritual entities.   
• Response Mechanism: Sound can also be a medium through which spirits are believed to respond, with shamans interpreting these auditory phenomena as messages from the spiritual realm.

Ritualistic Soundscapes:

• Ceremonial Spaces: The acoustics of ceremonial spaces (like caves or specially designed ritual chambers) are used to amplify and enrich sound, creating an immersive environment that enhances spiritual communication.   
• Echoes and Resonance: Natural acoustics, such as echoes and resonances in caves or built structures, may be interpreted as the voices of spirits or deities responding to the shaman.

3. Healing and Therapeutic Uses

Sound Healing:

• Restorative Frequencies: Certain sounds and rhythms are believed to have healing properties, restoring balance and harmony to the body and mind.   
• Instrumental Healing: Instruments like drums, flutes, and singing bowls are used to produce sounds that are thought to facilitate physical and emotional healing.

Diagnostic Sounds:

• Listening to the Body: Some shamanic practices involve listening to the body’s sounds (like heartbeats or breaths) to diagnose illness or imbalance.   
• Healing Chants and Songs: Specific chants or songs are used to target different ailments, with the shaman's voice considered a powerful healing tool.

4. Enhancing Rituals and Ceremonies

Ritual Structure:

• Sound Cues: Sound signals different phases of a ritual, marking transitions from one state or activity to another.   
• Community Involvement: Collective chanting, singing, or drumming involves the community, reinforcing social bonds and shared spiritual experiences.

Symbolic Sounds:

• Animal Sounds: Mimicking animal sounds or using instruments that produce similar effects can symbolize the presence or assistance of animal spirits.   
• Elemental Sounds: Sounds representing natural elements (like thunder drums for storms or rain sticks for water) invoke the power and presence of these elements in rituals.

5. Cultural and Contextual Variations

Regional Practices:

• Cultural Diversity: Different cultures have unique shamanic traditions with specific instruments, vocal techniques, and sound rituals. For example, Siberian shamans might use drum patterns distinct from those used by Amazonian shamans.   
• Contextual Adaptations: The use of sound in shamanism can vary depending on the context, such as healing, divination, or community ceremonies.

Technological Integration:

• Modern Adaptations: Contemporary shamans may integrate modern musical instruments and technology, such as electronic soundscapes, to enhance traditional practices.

Conclusion

Sound is an integral element of shamanic practices, serving as a bridge between the physical and spiritual worlds. Through rhythmic drumming, chanting, and the use of resonant spaces, shamans induce altered states of consciousness, facilitate communication with spirits, and perform healing rituals. The study of these acoustic practices through archaeoacoustics can deepen our understanding of ancient shamanic traditions and their enduring impact on cultural rituals and spiritual practices today.

Archaeoacoustics and 'Songs of the Caves'

Archaeoacoustics is a sub-field of archaeology and acoustics which studies the relationship between people and sound throughout history. It is an interdisciplinary field with methodological contributions from acoustics, archaeology, and computer simulation, and is broadly related to topics within cultural anthropology such as experimental archaeology and ethnomusicology. Since many cultures have sonic components, applying acoustical methods to the study of archaeological sites and artifacts may reveal new information on the civilizations examined.

 

The importance of sound in ritual practice is well attested by historical and anthropological evidence. Voices and instruments (pipes, drums) will also have played a key role for prehistoric societies, and a number of studies have sought to demonstrate that by measuring the acoustical properties of archaeological spaces and open-air locations. One of the principal difficulties, however, is to establish a robust methodology. Every space or location will have an acoustic signature, but that does not imply that vocal or musical performance was an essential part of ritual practice; nor that those places were specially designed or selected for their acoustical properties.
 

Palaeolithic painted caves have occupied a special place in this debate since studies in the 1980s suggested that the placement of paintings and murals within the caves might have been guided by the acoustics; that they might be directly correlated with resonance. In 2013, Durham University (Durham, England) archaeologist Chris Scarre joined a team of acousticians, archaeologists and musicians led by Professor Rupert Till (Huddersfield University) in a systematic on-site analysis of acoustic properties and prehistoric motifs in five Upper Palaeolithic painted caves in northern Spain: La Garma, El Castillo, La Pasiega, Las Chimeneas and Tito Bustillo. The Arts and Humanities Research Council funded project was supported by Spanish colleagues Manuel Rojo-Guerra and Roberto Ontañon, with permission from the Gobierno de Cantabria and Gobierno Del Principado de Asturias.
 

Their methodology in recording the acoustics of these caves was to use a swept-sine (also called a chirp) source signal in conjunction with a set of microphones, adjusting the position of the set-up to provide an overview of the acoustics of specific sections of the caves. In each location that was measured, the position of imagery on the cave walls was also recorded. The fieldwork generated a large body of data that was used to generate acoustic maps of the five caves that could be compared with the distribution of the imagery (paintings or engravings, representational images of animals, or abstract symbols). A Principal Components Analysis (a mathematical method used to reduce a large data set into a smaller one while maintaining most of its variation information) provided an averaged set of acoustical characteristics. This showed that the variance of the acoustic data can be explained by two main components, associated with (a) temporal decay of energy (rate at which it fades to silence) in the cave space and (b) the existence or absence of resonance. Other factors, such as the distance of motifs from the original cave entrances (some of them now blocked) were also recorded.
 

Statistical analysis concluded that motifs in general, and lines and dots in particular, are statistically more likely to be found in places where reverberation is moderate and where the low frequency acoustic response has evidence of resonant behavior. The results suggest that the location of Palaeolithic motifs might indeed be associated with acoustic features, and that an appreciation of sound could have influenced behavior among Palaeolithic societies using these caves. The study also demonstrated the application of a systematic methodology of recording and analysis to the archaeoacoustics of prehistoric spaces.

The Archaeoacoustics of Palenque

An excerpt from my memoir, Riding Spirit Horse: A Journey into Shamanism.

 

Like a golden, luminous jewel, Palenque perches above the lush tropical rainforest in the foothills of the Chiapas Highlands of Southern Mexico, facing the setting sun. Shrouded in morning jungle mists and echoing to a dawn chorus of howler monkeys and parrots, this archaeological site has a serene, mystical atmosphere. A tranquil stream meanders through the city center and the temple summits offer spectacular views of the ruins and surrounding jungle. Built in the eighth century, Palenque, or Nah Chan (House of the Serpent), is a Maya city of unsurpassed beauty and spiritual force. The city's ruins were designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.

Archaeologist Francisca Zalaquett, from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, discovered that the temples and public squares in Palenque could clearly project the sounds of a human speaker and musical instruments of the time across at least a hundred meters, or about the length of a football field. The investigation identified rooms that could have been used by musicians, speakers or priests to amplify the frequency, quality and volume of sound, allowing the music or the message to travel further and reach more people. The findings strongly suggest the design and structures at Palenque involved a great deal of knowledge about acoustics and the behavior of sound.

In his book Healing Sounds, author Jonathan Goldman recounts an incredible experience he had at Palenque in 1987. He described it as one of the more dramatic episodes in his life. Late one night, a guide took Goldman and five traveling companions on a tour of Palenque. The guide said he would show them a Palenque which they would not otherwise experience and took them into one temple that had been closed to the public, leading them down a subterranean level using his flashlight. He pointed to a doorway and said to Goldman, "Make sound here." He had known about Goldman's interest in sound healing, but Goldman could not figure out why the guide wanted him to do this.

Then the guide turned out his flashlight and the group was immersed in total darkness. "Make sound," the guide urged.

"Sure," Goldman replied.

Goldman began to tone harmonics towards the area the guide had indicated before the light went out. As he did so, the room began to become illuminated, but it was not like the light from a flashlight. It was more subtle, but it was definitely lighter in the room. Goldman could see the faint outlines and figures of the people there. Everyone was aware of this and when Goldman stopped toning, the room filled with exclamations. Then the guide turned on the flashlight again and they continued their tour.

The full implications of this experience did not occur to Goldman until he returned to the United States. Somehow, he was able to use sound to create light. This was not the same phenomenon as sound turning into light, a scientific theory in which a sound wave, when speeded up, becomes light. This was different, having to do with creating light through sound, and specifically vocal harmonics or overtones.

Years later, Goldman was talking to a man who had spent years with the Lacandon Maya people of the Chiapas rainforest, who are said to be the descendants of the builders of Palenque. When Goldman told him about his experience in Palenque, he nodded his head and said: "You are very lucky to have experienced this! It is something that the Mayan shamans teach, this creation of light through harmonics. It is the higher harmonics that do this." (1)

1. Jonathan Goldman, Healing Sounds: The Power of Harmonics. (Element Books, 1992), p. 59.

Our Ancestors, the Acoustical Engineers

Chavín de Huántar

New discoveries in the young field of archaeoacoustics hint that just as we create elaborate sonic environments with our electronic stereos and theatre sound systems, the ancients may have sculpted their soundscapes as well. In a recent article in Discover Magazine, archaeologists demonstrated that ancient builders of the temple complex of Chavín de Huántar in central Peru designed subterranean soundscapes as stirring as any special effects. In short, the temple's designers may have been not only expert architects but also skilled acoustical engineers. View the Chavín acoustic findings video.

The Archaeoacoustics of the Maya Pyramid of Kukulkan

On my first pilgrimage to the Maya ceremonial center of Chichen Itza in March 1995, I discovered that an incredible acoustic phenomenon can be heard at the Pyramid of Kukulkan. If you clap your hands directly in front of the pyramid's main staircase, it echoes back an almost mechanical bird-like chirping sound. Handclaps from different positions along the base of the staircase likewise trigger the echo, but with different musical tones spanning half an octave. Tour guides and tourists like to clap their hands to hear a chirped echo in a range of different notes. 

Me atop Kukulkan Pyramid in 1995

In 1998 acoustician David Lubman recorded the hand-clap echoes at Kukulkan Pyramid and compared them with recordings of the nearly extinct Quetzal, the sacred bird associated with both the name of the pyramid and its plumed serpent deity Kukulkan/Quetzalcoatl. He found that recordings and sonograms of several echoes really do match the bird's cry. Even more amazing is that same clap also seems to echo back the sound of a rattlesnake off the stairway of the nearby Temple of the Warriors a split second after the bird sound. On either side of the stairway are two stone columns four feet wide, carved to represent feathered rattlesnakes. It takes a while to find the right spot to clap to get the effect of both sounds, but it's worth it to hear that at least once in a lifetime. 

Whether the pyramid was built to deliberately produce these evocative echoes, or it happened by chance, is still a matter of debate among scientists and archaeologists. Inspection and ray acoustic modeling provide a simple physical explanation for the chirped echo -- the "picket fence effect" due to periodic sound reflections from the treads of the staircase. The reason that a chirp like a bird is produced is because of geometry. The time between later reflections is longer than early reflections causing the frequency of the echo to rapidly drop by about an octave.

Me in the Ballcourt with friends-1995

The Great Ballcourt is another structure at Chichen Itza that displays unusual and unexplained acoustic anomalies. The stone walls act like an acoustic waveguide and words softly whispered at one end of the ball court (measuring 545 feet long by 225 feet wide) are clearly audible all the way at the other end and a single clap or shout sounded in the center of the ball court will produce nine distinct echoes. According to acoustician David Lubman, "the Great Ballcourt (GBC) can produce mind-bending sound effects supportive of ancient Maya mythology described in their best-known creation story, the Popol Vuh. GBC sound effects include hallucinatory disembodied voices, shouting crowds, the whooping of an invisible bird flying rapidly through the playing field, and, with middling success, growling jaguars and menacing rattlesnakes. These animals are also represented in GBC carvings and frescoes."

Lubman's findings at Chichen Itza suggest that its ancient builders were skilled theatrical sound designers who engineered sound for mind manipulation. Sound effects discovered so far seem uniquely appropriate for each monument and may be intentional designs. If the theory of intentional design has merit, we are led to two extraordinary conjectures. The Maya may be the only people known to have "coded" a sound into stone. The chirped echo at this 1300-year-old Maya pyramid in the Yucatan may be the world's oldest known sound recording!

The Archaeoacoustics of Rock Art Caves

According to a new analysis of paleolithic caves in France, prehistoric peoples chose places of natural resonant sound to draw their famed cave sketches. This research, known as archaeoacoustics, has shown that ancient rock art was often placed on surfaces or in locations that focus, amplify, and transform the sounds of human voices and musical instruments. Instruments such as bone flutes and bullroarers; bone and ivory instruments that whir rhythmically when spun, have been found in decorated caves. Read more.