Another Music Magic Experiment

Kat and I are reading the Spiritual Dimension of Music by R. J. Stewart. It has several exercises in it and I've tried them out solo as well as doing them with Kat. One of the exercises involves using different tones of music to raise energy through your body, while humming and/or vocalizing the tones. Another exercises involves using vowels to set up a magical circle, with each vowel representing one of the four cardinal directions and/or spirit.

I've decided to integrate the tonal exercise into my daily practice, and may integrate the vowel exercise as well, as I can distinctly feel the energy that is raised when I do these music magic exercises. I've always had an affinity for singing (I used to be in chorus in high school) and feel that the voice is one of the most powerful tools a magician can have, if properly trained and worked with.

When I've done these practices with Kat, I've noticed an enhancement to the work I'm doing. It seems like we amplify each other's signal and consequently the magical work is also amplified.

I've taken this work and also applied it to existing music magic that I've been doing, specifically working with the Tuvan throat singing.I've tried to integrate the tuvan throat singing with the vowels and tones. I haven't had too much luck with it so far, but it does take some work. Nonetheless its fascinating work and I'll share more as I continue to try things out.

Book Review: When Why...IF by Robin Wood

I'm not a Wiccan and I mention that because it's an important caveat to this review. This book was written for Wiccans and primarily deals with ethics from that perspective. I'll admit that I didn't really care for this book. At times I found the author to be condescending. She came off as a stern mother lecturing her way-ward son about how to behave. I also didn't see a lot of commentary on magic and ethics which I hoped for. I suspect the lack of it has more to do with the fact that its a book on Wiccan ethics, wherein Wicca tends to treat magic as a secondary activity. If you're Wiccan, this could be a useful book for providing some guidance on expected behaviors.  If you're a practitioner of other Pagan religions or more focused on magical practice, this book will probably not be that helpful.

How the Wishsong of Shannara introduced me to music magic

I've been re-reading the Shannara books lately and I just finished the Wish Song of Shannara, which has always been one of my favorites of Terry Brooks's books. Something which always fascinated me about the book was the description of the wish song, which allowed a character to sing illusions and/or possibilities into reality. Reading that book was what inspired me to explore the combination of magic and music, especially via singing.

One of my first experiments with music and magic involved the creation of an entity that could was activated by signing or vibrating its name. I found it to be very useful, because I simply had to vocally sign the name in order to activate it. That was inspired by the Wishsong, and also by William Gray's writing on vocalization. But if I hadn't read wishsong, I wouldn't have thought to explore that direction. While I knew, after reading the book, that I couldn't do what the characters could do, I still felt inspired by the idea of incorporating my voice into magical work.

Even now I continue to experiment with my voice and magical work. I've been practicing throat singing, and also even trying different tongue positions in combination with vocalization to see how it changes the tone and vibration of the sounds. This is especially useful when doing invocations because it allows you to sonically and vibrationally connect with the entity you want to work with.

This is why I love pop culture. It can inspire exploration and experimentation. Most books on magic don't talk about music and magic all that much and so for me my inspiration came from reading a fantasy book that provided an idea I could explore in my magical work.