15

Cosmic Consciousness

196-208

p. 200

"A secular example of ... compassion in the Adagio for Strings by Samuel Barber (1910-1981). ... the work exist in two versions : a ... less well-known one ...,

p. 201

part of ... his Op. 11; and the usual ... stand-alone movement ... . The latter truly brings out the transcendental character of this music. ... I know of only one recording for the Adagio for Strings that expresses its full power ... : that [Sony Classical MHK 62837] of Thomas Schippers and the New York Philharmonic."

"The song "Only Time" from Enya's 2000 album A Day Without Rain [Warner Brothers 47426] is a nonclassical example of secular ... compassion, without the sadness of Barber's Adagio. ... Enya's song is full of ... radiance. The lyrics communicate ...

acceptance of all that seems to go wrong in life, or at least not according

{Seemingly awry (viz., in a short-range view), merely, but not in the long-range view, wherein all events are perceived to happen for the best.}

p. 202

to our expectations."

""Wind on Water," the first track from Evening Star [Editions EEGCD 3], a 1975 collaboration between Brian Eno and Robert Fripp (b. 1946), ... has qualities of radiance and timelessness ... and demonstrates ... metarhythm. In many respects, "Wind on Water" might make a better soundtrack for my out-of-body visits to the Afterlife".

"Such a tour, of course, could include

Enya's "Only Time" (... compassion),

Yes's "The Gates of Delirium" (... grace), and

Eno and Fripp's "Wind on Water" (... union)."

"The Adagio for Schubert's String Quintet is the most radiant music that the composer ever wrote. ... Here is an example of what Scott would call ethereal music, buddhic in its serenity. ... Schubert composed the work during the last several months of his life. He must have known that he was doomed to die of ... syphilis".

16

Praeparing for TMEs

209-28

p. 225

"Eberhard Weber's jazz composition, "Silent Feet," from the album of the same name [ECM 1107], touches on ... making it a musical tour of most of the continuum of human potential. ... I recommend listening to "Silent Feet" ... . The ... listening should occur with eyes closed ... . Subsequent listenings to "Silent Feet" could perhaps launch you beyond perceiving the process configuration into a transcendental experience

p. 226

of your own soul or the cosmic normative balance ... . During each hearing, try to feel ... the interplay of centers".

p. 227

""Silent Feet" is ... Composed macrorhythmically, the the piece has three parts.

The first part is a gradually accumulating wave of energy.

The second part rides the crest of that wave.

The third part begins with a sudden dissipation of this accumulated energy, which ... gradually dissolves."

17

Listening as a Spiritual Practice

231-44

p. 243

"In the present ..., I provide ... the psychic signature of a jazz piece, John Coltrane's 1964 masterpiece, A Love Supreme. [Impulse GRD 155] [JC:LS] ...

One of the greatest spiritual teachers in jazz is John Coltrane. ... he ... experienced what he calls a "spiritual awakening" in 1957. Many of Coltrane's subsequent recordings exemplified spiritual aspirations dating back to that awakening. ... As a spiritual teacher in music, Coltrane is driven by the desire for self-transcendence ... through his music. According to Berendt [1992, p. 435], A Love Supreme "combines spiritual fervor ... in a way not heretofore achieved in jazz." It embodies these ... : "ELATION -- ELEGANCE -- EXALTATION ... .""

p. 244

"the music targets ... expressing an awe-inspired love of God that is solemn, serious, and mystical."

18

Good Music versus Bad Music

245-59

p. 251

"the Yes song "Close to the Edge," from the 1972 album of that name [Atlantic 82666] [Y:CE], ...

p. 252

keeps moving back and forth between the realm of intellect, dominated by the ego ..., and that of intuition, which is closer to the soul ..., as if crossing a boundary. This boundary between ego and soul is reflected in the song's title".

""Starship Trooper," from The Yes Album [Atlantic 82665] [Y:YS], is for "moving energy up and down within oneself." I hear the three parts of this song as moving through three levels of intensity within ... the visionary".

""Wonderous Stories" from Yes's 1977 album Going for the One [Atlantic 82670] [Y:GO], is "a storytelling song about meeting a spiritual guide." ...

The song "Awaken," also from Going for the One, ... begins in the visionary realm ... and soon crosses over to the sublime realm ... . Most of the ... song is a luminous macrorhythmic wave ..., providing one of the longest periods of exposure to the expanded consciousness ... in rock music."

p. 259

""The Gates of Delirium" [Y:"GD"] from Yes's 1974 album Relayer [Atlantic 82664] ... achieves the grace ... of cosmic consciousness ... . ... . ... the music rises into ... timelessness and inner peace, as well as depicting the heavenly light ... full of divine love and compassion, ... calling us home to the Source."

p. 252

"Yes's 1973 album Tales from Topographic Oceans [Atlantic 82683] ... was inspired by Paramahamsa Yogananda's Autobiography of a Yogi.

p. 253

... I was struck by its energetic similarity to Todd Rundgren's Initiation [Rhino 70866], which was inspired by the esotericist Alice Bailey's Treatise on the Cosmic Fire. ...

In the yoga of listening, either could be used as preparation for higher consciousness work. ... For listeners who are more interested in the expanded consciousness ..., I recommend Yes's "Awaken.""

19

Musicians as Spiritual Teachers

260-76

p. 269

"Mozart wrote The Magic Flute as an expression of his belief in the mystical principles of the Masonic Order, into which he was initiated in 1784. ...

p. 270

The ... opera ... produces transcendental mirth ... . ... Mozart juxtaposes ... the noble, spiritual resolve of ... a candidate for initiation into the Masonic mysteries."

p. 397, n. 19:19

"Mozart ... wrote a number of cantatas ... based on Masonic texts. This music would be ... available on CD, ... Mozart's Complete Masonic Music (VoxBox CDX 5055). [M:CMM] ... this music indicates that Mozart was far more spiritual than popular belief ... has portrayed him to be."

"By the end of his life, Wagner had achieved the status of intuitive mind composer. In his last opera, Parsifal [which "was banned" during the Nazi era (infra p. 277)], he ... was attempting to rise above the ecstatic, world-transcending mirth ... of the illumined mind, which he expressed in Die Meistersinger, to achieve ... compassion".

"Bach's last work, the Art of Fugue, ... contains a life-changing radiance, although few performers are spiritually developed enough to bring out its full force." (B:AF)

20

Wagner the Seer

277-94

"during the Nazi era. Parsifal was banned from the repertory".

{"Productions of Parsifal were generally unheard of during WWII ... . Nazi Germany ... rejected the work’s pacifistic ... values and refused to stage it" ("EPWP", p. 51).}

"Cyril Scott claimed that some portions of Wagner's operas portray a buddhic love that lies beyond even the human love for God. ... The ... presence of the higher or "buddhic" ... represents ... his desire to portray ... the most sublime or divine."

p. 278

"Wagner intended to start a religion in which art was the focal point, rather than the ritual and dogmas ... . The temple of this

p. 279

new religion was to be the Bayreuth Festival Opera House ... . Parsifal, with its amalgam of

Christian (Holy Grail)

{There is nothing very "Christian" about the Grail itself, nor about any of the characters (who are prae-Christian Cymry deities, etc.) in Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzifal.}

and Buddhist (world-renouncing compassion, reincarnation) elements, would be this new religion's central rite."

Richard Wagner "wanted to see the abolition of the old economic order ..., and to see it replaced by a revolutionary state, not unlike that envisioned by Karl Marx, in which all property would be owned in common."

{"John Bokina finds in Parsifal a "utopian vision of Romantic Anticapitalism" ... (107); a similar interpretation of Parsifal as an "anticapitalistic utopia" is advanced by Dieter Borchmeyer ..., 294." (William Kinderman : "The Genesis of the Music", pp. 174-5, fn. 44. In :- William Kinderman & Katherine Rae Syer (edd.) : A Companion to Wagner's Parsifal. Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge (Suffolk), 2005. pp. 133-76. http://books.google.com/books?id=qhBBRn3i9zsC&pg=PA175&lpg=PA175&dq= )}

"Near-death experiencers have often described spiritual beings of light who come to their aid. So it is with the Valkyries : In Germanic mythology, they are the heroic

female

{an immortal female for a mortal male (so that there must be an immortal male for a mortal female; as in the Zaratustrian "fravas^i")}

spiritual presences who act as guides in the transition to the Afterlife."

p. 287

"Die Meistersinger [W:MN] is throughout a work of the illumined mind. ...

p. 288

The musical highpoint of the opera is a quintet ... in the third act. Walther has received a master-song in a dream. ... The quintet, however, is perhaps the highest example of ... cosmic-consciousness, music that Wagner ever wrote."

p. 289

"The fusion of Buddhist ... elements in the opera appears primarily in the character of Kundry, a woman ... to reincarnate again and again because ... of laughing ... . Kundry spends half of her life ...

under the domination of Klingsor.

{Clinschor (Klingsor) is Hungarian; thus an allusion (via BUDA-pest [where /PEST/ = /JyES.T.ha/, a tantrik goddess, riding an ass similar to Cundrie's "yellow mule"]) to importation of her worship by the BODish tantrika-s.}

At the beginning of the opera, the present keeper of the Grail, Amfortas,

{While the "hundred carpets" (HG, p. 224) of Anfortas may indicate Kambhala ('Blanket', the antient name of Kabul in Afghanistan), Anfortas's being "Fisher King" may indicate the Ikhthuo-phagoi ('Fish-Eaters') of Gadrosia/Gedrosia (Baluc^istan). The name /Anvortas/, howbeit, may repraesent /anvartha/ 'conformable to the meaning , agreeing with the true meaning' (Ragh. iv:12 -- S-ED) : the health of Anfortas conformed to the meaning of the quaestion concerning it, asked by Parzifal.}

is suffering from a wound that won't heal, a result of his having succumbed to the erotic temptations of the Flower Maidens. ...

Parsifal ... stumbles upon the realm of the Grail ... . ...

{/Parzifal/ is (HG, p. 190) in Cymry /PeReDur/ = /PaRaDa/, name (in the Puran.a) of a tribe in Afghanistan.} {/Grail/, from Latin /gradual/, is perhaps intended as a pun on /Gadrosia/.}

Gurnemanz takes Parsifal to witness ... .

{/Gurne-manz/ may be Wagner's witness for the spelling of /Parzifal/ as /Parsifal/. /GuRne-MANZ/ may (besides indicating an connection with Vajra-yana god /MAN~Ju-ghos.a/) refer to /JaRatkaru/, name of (ID, p. 133) the grandfather of a hero who was much offended by the corpse of an animal emplaced by the king named /PARikS.It/ (cognate with the name /PARSI-val/) -- the Cymry aequivalent being "son of "York"" (HG, p. 191) in reference to the PARiSi tribe in ("P") East Yorkshire : for, Gurnemanz was much offended by (HG, p. 232) the dying of an animal.}

Kundry is redeemed in the process."

{This redemption diminished her (to "sink abominably", HG p. 266) : cf. (30YBS, p. 255) "cun.d.i (to become smaller)."}

p. 290

End of Act I : "a scene transformation, ... to an indoor temple, occurs. According to Heline, the bells that accompany these scene changes are "astral bells," indicating that the characters ... are leaving the physical world and entering a higher spiritual plane."

p. 291

End of Act III : "As before, "astral bells" again indicate a scene transformation ... to temple ...

when the Grail is revealed."

{The "Holy Grail" is sometimes a bowl : likewise, goddess Cunda's "major attribute is the patra or bowl" (IBSO, p. 284).}