Shamanism is an ancient healing system, practiced by a set of persons who claimed communication with the spiritual world.
Shamans, who were practitioners of this system, worked as messengers between the humans and the spirits, which they could summon for healing. Shamans were credited with healing ailments “by mending the soul” of those who were suffering. They could alleviate traumas affecting the soul/spirit, thereby restoring the physical body of the patient to normalcy. They could alter their levels of consciousness to obtain insights to problems afflicting the individual and society.
It was believed that Shamans visited the other realms of consciousness (worlds) to seek guidance in handling the problems of disharmony or disease. It was believed that the Shamans heal within a certain spiritual dimension by returning those parts of the human ‘soul’ which were ‘lost’ from wherever they had gone on their ‘spiritual voyage’.
Shamans in various cultures across the world did employ music and songs — to reach a stage of ecstasy, a state of altered level of consciousness from the `normal’ waking stage in which we all live. They used sounds of nature, birds, animals, etc., to create an ambience that enabled them to be in hype! Various kinds of musical instruments were employed to reach this intended state of consciousness.
Of all the instruments, drums enjoy a pride of place in Shamanic rituals as the resonance and beats from them have been a time-tested process – to alter one’s state of consciousness.
The importance of percussion in ritual music has been recognised since very ancient times. The drums were used in various cultures —from well-known Siberian to several other cultures. A recent explanation is based on a psycho-acoustic principle that the tempo created enables a Shaman to enter into the desired brain wave state, which corresponds to the number of beats per second. Shamans often used the single-headed drums, made from a selected tree and animal skin -dangling with metallic ritual objects which could make a rattling sound in their rituals.
Even the beater used for sounding the drum served as a rattle to increase its impact. The drum head was played over afire so as to adjust to the desired pitch. The physical gesture of drumming itself was integrated into a Shamanic dance form.
Rattles were mostly used in South Africa and South America, though they were quite popular in other parts of the world as well. They were used in ceremonies, especially among the Navajo. Gongs and bells were often found throughout South East Asia, though they were not uncommon elsewhere.
Shamanic music included both music used as part of Shamans’ rituals and music that refers to, or draws on, this. It must be appreciated here that a Shaman’s ritual is a ritual and is not just a musical, performance or entertainment through songs and percussion. Thus a Shamanic musical performance involves a flow of action and not just a melodic sound or orchestration that fascinates a musically-educated audience.
As the music is directed more to the spirits than to the audience, listening to this was based more on the feelings involved than with any analysis whatsoever. In fact, this realisation helps in shaping the musical dimension.
It is also known that the Shaman has a more active musical role than the medium in spirit-possession. A Shaman, therefore, uses the sounds variously to achieve his objective. His attention is directed inwards as it involves visualisation of the spirit world, communication with the spirit and whatnot. Thus a Shamanic musical performance is devoid of any musical virtuosity and can be distinguished with its frequent discontinuity or distortion of any aesthetic norm that goes with music.
Breaks in Shamanic music are explained as the results of the Shamans finding difficulty with a spirit and his need to call yet another cooperative spirit and so on. This results in the music performance being broken off abruptly, perhaps to be recommenced subsequently.
It is believed that Shamanism and spirit possession involve contrasting states of mind. While a Shaman actively enters a spirit world (by using an appropriate sound or music), the possessed medium (victim) is a passive recipient of a more powerful spirit. This also reflects the musical difference!
Thus, the possession music is typically long in duration, loud, intense and mesmeric and with climaxes of rhythmic intensity in high decibels.
In fact, this musical feature can even be found in the present-day Hindu rituals. Performing ‘aarti’ at the end of a prayer (`puja’) accompanies loud sounds of metals, percussion drums, cymbals, gongs and bells to create a frenzied ambience! In South Indian marriages too, a long pipe (nadaswaram) is played loudly with the powerful two-faced drum (tavil) whose beats can be heard from a faraway place without the need of any loud-speakers! Such music has the psycho-acoustic quality of energising the listeners with certain resolution or dedication.
The Sound Quality
A sound engineer would agree that sound is tactile. As the auditory impact of a sound can be both inside and outside of a human body, the visual information (or message) which is conveyed is internal. For instance, sounds such as imitation of a waterfall (created through music instruments in an artificial manner) leads one to visualise the water that falls and flows. Thus, the environment created by Shaman with the help of the created sound is too subjective and personal. Here, sound acts as a catalyst in the process of making a sacred time-space which enables a Shaman to reach a spirit world and to communicate with its inhabitants!
Role of Bells
The Siberian Shamanism (one of the oldest and elaborate Shamanic systems in the world) employs hanging metallic objects — including small bells – attached to the Shaman’s ritual cloak and also to the inside of the drum (besides the beater stick used for drumming). This sets up a non-stop experience of a moving sound field. Not only the Shaman’s body movement, but also the technique of music vocalisation by singing into the drum which creates an echo effect. This causes an illusion that the sound emanates from ‘some other realm’.
It is interesting that the humble Jew’s harp used in Carnatic music even today has a long history of what is called `Shamanising’ the soundscape! No doubt the concerts in Chennai in which this instrument is especially used has a mesmerising impact on the audience!
Ancient Chinese believed that tiny bells, which oscillate musically to the breeze, have a purifying role in the mindscape of people around. As the Shamanic rituals involving the `alien’ spirits were considered `dangerous’ and ‘polluting’, it was thought that the bells could overpower such ‘pollution’ ! Besides, a bell could be used for calling as well as for sending back the spirits by the Shaman.
Healing
The Shamanic ritual had thus employed sound for healing purposes. It was, of course, conceived as a way of directing spiritual energy from the Shaman into an afflicted person. In Tuva, sick persons are reported to have healed by the sound of a stringed instrument, made from a tree struck by lightning.
The Shaman’s song — which is personal to the Shaman — which tells his birth place, initiation to the spirit world, ancestral pedigree etc. is composed by the shaman himself and sung at the commencement of every session. Called `algys’, this is also accompanied by drumming on the tongue drum. The song is said to introduce the Shaman to the spirits!
An essential aspect in many shamanic cultures relates to the belief and practice relating to imitation of natural sounds. In icy mountains, women imitating the sounds of the reindeer calf has been a traditional practice in order to ensure fertility. There are also anecdotes such as a Nganasan Shaman, by name Dyukhade Kosterkin, imitating the sound of a polar bear and transforming himself into one!
In a Khanty Shamanic seance, the Shaman is reported to have mimicked as if the direction of the sound were moving. It also sounded as if the Shaman had flown around in the tent and left. Later, the voices of various animals (cuckoo, hoopoe, owl, duck, squirrel etc) could be heard. Then it was imitated as if the Shaman had flown back into the tent, singing his song.
Among the tribes near the Altai mountains, there is a ritual of drinking beer which is poured into the skin and wood of a new drum as a tribute to the spirits of the tree and the animal (deer) from which it is made, as the Shaman chants the names of the tree and the animal, imitating their behavior and voices through gesture and sound. In a Sovot Shamanic song, one imitates the sounds of birds and wolves invoking their blessings.
It is interesting that in recent times music groups are re-emerging to a considerable extent. The Siberians who had excelled in Shamanism, have revived this belief system since 1980. Many musicians have now formed bands drawing on Shamanic traditions. Examples are: Cholbon, AiTal, -Sakha, Yakutsk, Biosyntes and Yat-Kha. In the west, many bands apply the label `shamanic’ loosely, the same way modern art is referred to as ‘tantric’ art!
Korea is the only country where Shamanism is practiced as a state religion. The music used here is more elaborate than elsewhere. Indians have adopted the Shamanic traditions which have not only evolved into the yogic systems such as nada yoga, but also in a much more elaborate way through their rich music systems: be it Carnatic or Hindustani.
Even today the musicians are taught to listen to shruti drone and to synchronise their songs and music into it—a practical way to bring together the external reality into the internal reality in a harmonic manner! There is a very recent movement led by a small group of volunteers, consisting of spiritualists, professionals and musicians belonging to a loose outfit, Nada Centre for Music Therapy to revive the lost sound traditions, known as ‘nada yoga’. The long-prevailing practice of giving a sonorous identity to deities in Hinduism (like Lord Shiva with damaru drum, Krishna with flute, Saraswati with Veena, Vishnu with conch-shell, etc.) traces back their origin to the pre-vedic Shamanic and tantric cultures prevalent in the Indian subcontinent. Like the ancient Shamans, the Indian singers also can be found in a trance state, closing their eyes and internalising the sound as they externalise it! Before Buddhism came to Tibet, the local form of Shamanism was Bon, whose practices were incorporated in Buddhism there. Thus, a Shaman’s drum on a pole became part of Tibetan Buddhist ritual music ensembles. Also, the shang – a kind of bell-cymbal, which was originally used by the Shamans to clear away negative energy, came to occupy in the Buddhist rituals.
This article was published in Bhavan’s Journal – July 15, 2011 – Pages 78 to 84
Edited by Geeta Shreedar, August 12, 2021