New Spiritualibus Blog Posts – Excerpts – Page 28 of 67

July 20, 2023November 1, 2023

Total honesty

Total honesty
Within and out
Turns invincible
To the extent
Of realization
In motivation
Untouchable
In freedom
Spirituality
No different
From physical
Cast in bodies
Attitudes vary
As cycles churn
So many lessons
Aiming to unfold
Consciousness
Not artificial
Autopiloting
But all alive
In meaning
Target truth
Individually
But difficult
Collectively
Ultimately
One for all
Or all for one
Total honesty
Within and out
All life and love.

“From here to now” — on a flying carpet

Phrygian on E — 6-string guitar, voice, tenor recorder, bass bowl — 7:39

شمس تبریزی — Shams-i Tabrīzī, Persian poet, 1185–1248

“No matter what people call you, you are just who you are. Keep to this truth. You must ask yourself how is it you want to live your life. We live and we die, this is the truth that we can only face alone. No one can help us. So consider carefully, what prevents you from living the way you want to live your life?”

“The whole universe is sum up in the Human Being.
Devil is not a monster waiting to trap us,
He is a voice inside.
Look for Your Devil in Yourself,
not in the Others.
Don’t forget that the one who knows his Devil,
knows his God.”

— Shams-i Tabrīzī, as quoted on many internet platforms, e.g. Goodreads, A-Z Quotes, etc.

Hear it, see it, feel it, and pass it on — in total honesty

July 18, 2023July 18, 2023

July 2023 Tonalibus update

Recent concerts

Playlist update

Website update

This July 2023 Tonalibus update touches on two recent concert adventures and highlights the rapid emergence of Playlist K “Refreshing as a summer breeze”. Further, it announces slight changes in the website menu structure and the expansion of the main page of the Spiritualibus blog.

Two recent Tonalibus concerts in early July

On Thursday July 6, Ursula Huggenberger and Tonalibus Ulrico presented a natural sound journey in the glorious acoustics of the Fideris church, Grisons. Live recordings, photos, and a brief story of this event are available under July 2023 live sounds. Further, a three and a half minute video clip is on Instagram. (Click on the crossed out speaker icon for sound).

On Saturday July 1, the Schlimo summer fest ’23 celebrated with an open-air concert and theater on the grounds of a magnificent estate in Gurzelen near Thun. Tonalibus Ulrico provided the opening of the live program with “Sound carpets, as refreshing as a summer breeze”. (There are no recordings from this event. Click on photo to the left to enlarge.)

July 2023 Tonalibus playlists update

Playlist K “Refreshing as a summer breeze” follows Playlist J, which was announced complete in June. So far Playlist K has already grown to present eight pieces covering forty-four minutes of new improvisations, such as some from the Fideris sound journey and a few with a new lap slide guitar, including “Fused oriental occident and occidental orient” (below).

“Fused…” — ReachMin (Phrygian dominant) on G# — fretted vichitra veena, lap slide guitar, crotales, tanpura — 8:01

Tonalibus website update of July 2023

The main menu structure changed slightly in the order of its options. In the Fidibus shop, all Playlists now appear grouped with all their titles. Tonalities of the month moved under Tonalities, and Chromaticism and modulation under Concepts. Further, the main page of the Spiritualibus blog received a new look. It now includes short blog excerpts in the list of the most recent posts of all categories and of Omnibus posts.

Best wishes from the heart!
Ulrico

July 14, 2023July 14, 2023

Conspiracies

Conspiracies
Come and go
With spirit
Inspirations
More or less
Intermixed
In illusions
Or believes
Try action
In reality
See what
Crumbles
Facing life
And love
If it drops
Or rises up
Supposed
As a truth
For some
To believe
With spirit
Conspired
Religion
Detach
Be free
In spirit
Miracles
Of all life
And love.

“Fused oriental occident and occidental orient”

ReachMin (Phrygian dominant) on G# — fretted vichitra veena, lap slide guitar, crotales, tanpura — 8:01

Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī, 13th-century Persian poet

“Learn the alchemy true human beings know.
The moment you accept what troubles
you’ve been given, the door will open.
Welcome difficulty, as a familiar comrade.
Joke with torment brought by the Friend.
Sorrows are the rags of old clothes
and jackets that serve to cover,
and then are taken off.
That undressing,
and the naked body underneath,
is the sweetness that comes after grief.”

“The hurt you embrace becomes joy.
Call it to your arms where it can change.
A silkworm eating leaves makes a cocoon.
Each of us weaves a chamber of leaves and sticks.
Silkworms begin to truly exist as they disappear inside that room.
Without legs, we fly. When I stop speaking,
this poem will close, and open its silent wings. . . .”

— A Year with Rumi, Daily Readings, Coleman Barks, pp. 341 and 333 (also on YouTube 14:43-19:50, read by Coleman Barks with music by the late David Darling)

Sparrow recovering from glass wall conspiracies

June 27, 2023July 11, 2023

Tonality of the month: PhrygReach

PhrygReach or Neapolitan minor — calm sound sample, extensive (a.k.a. “Peaceful heart” — slowly but surely) — 8-string guitar, tingsha cymbal pair, tanpura — 5:10 — as loop on a separate tab (or via right click, if available)

The tonality of the month for July/August 2023 is PhrygReach or Neapolitan minor — a fully anchored Reach heptatonality and prime Na tonality. The name indicates that the lower tetrachord has a Phrygian tonal character and that a Reach step (augmented second) is in the upper tetrachord. Two axes are at symmetrical angles. Its harmonically least anchored pitch, the major seventh, contributes much to this tonality’s flavoring. It is essential in framing the fundamental or octave between two successive half steps. Plus it forms the Reach step and the second axis. But most of all, the major seventh adds a distinct major flavored contrast to the underlying, otherwise very pronounced Phrygian or minor structure.

You may enjoy a sound sample or tonality loop as sound mantra for contemplation or meditation. This can help with upliftment, purification, and focusing. Or it could simply be used as soothing background sound for relaxation and regeneration. If you care to hum, chant, or sing along, you could use a spiritually charged syllable like HU or Ōṃ / Aum ॐ, or another mantra syllable that suits you.

Tonality of the month: PhrygReach or Neapolitan minor — summary visualization of pitches, intervals, and harmonic axes

June 23, 2023June 23, 2023

Words and values

Words and values
To communicate
Or simply noise
To get attention
And influence
But it’s true
Individuality
Of one or some
Feeling as many
Wish they were
Any given status
Flushed far out
For freedom
At long last
To simply be
Passing on
Values found
While living
With words
Outspoken
And read
Else lost
On pages
Forever
Here
And
Now

“Blue sound step ahead” — all the same and different

PentaMin / PentaEol (pentatonic minor) — bass, 8-string guitar, lap slide guitar, tanpura — 5:47

All you fight against, you are — words and values

Lately he recalled a thought from his youth, from when he was a teen. It went something like this: “That all you fight against, you are, that is something which is. So stop fighting, and you are!” Well, it took him over half a century to come back to this and to a point of realizing and living this by being just himself, increasingly free of fighting, accepting nature and life in every way, to let things and beings be, let life be as it is. Indeed, after all, that is something which is!

No words, just an image of untold value

Words and values — Sunset caressing a wheat field by a tree on top of a hill — June 2023 — Saurenhorn, Switzerland