Courage it takes To be oneself Fulfilled and free To be all true Standing up tall Surfing the winds That rip and rattle To shake it lose And liberate all To be detached Let go entirely In the present Moment upon Moment again Until here now I am that I am And that is all As well as nothing Ever and never.
“Blue Courage” — a Dorian mode blues medley
Dorian — 8-string guitar, singing saw, tingsha cymbals, crotales, gongs, and voice — 5:08 — as loop on a separate tab
Grammar of animacy
“I come here to listen, to nestle in the curve of the roots in a soft hollow of pine needles, to lean my bones against the column of white pine, to turn off the voice in my head until I can hear the voices outside it: the shhh of wind in needles, water trickling over rock, nuthatch tapping, chipmunks digging, beechnut falling, mosquito in my ear, and something more — something that is not me, for which we have no language, the wordless being of others in which we are never alone.” — Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer, p. 48
Courage it takes to step out
Looking out from the safety of woods into the cool winter world — January 2022 — Grächwil/Meikirch, Switzerland
Some things fit And others don’t; Only you can tell For your very self.
What did fit once May not fit now; And what did not May now maybe.
Beyond possibilities The very realities Of a one and only Soul and self.
A seeking stranger A strange seeker Finding the good The good finder.
Good, not better! Better is worse. What is best?
“From the Future to the Present and Back”
From G# TetraNA with touches of its F# Upcor inversion progressing to C# Ionian (diatonic major) and back, connecting the far ends and melting contrasts into a unified whole — 8-string guitar — December 2021 — 9:45 — as loop on a separate tab
The Cyrus Charter
The fragments of the Cyrus Cylinder from the 6th century BC honor the Persian king Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid empire. Many historians regard this cylinder as early or first declaration of human rights. Here is a translation or interpretation of a portion of it:
“Everyone shall live according to his religion, respect women, and help the poor. Everyone may speak the language of his tribe. Only with human values can you be human. … To break the chains…, the freedom of the slaves, and honoring the elders is my wish.”
Snapdragon survivor chilled
Surviving snapdragon bud reaching above the snow cover — December 2021 — Grächwil, Switzerland
Mighty old oak, so beautiful and strong, Beyond this very age you reach and stretch Branches to the sky and roots in olden depths.
Majestic you stand your ground so tall On the very top of this sweet, rolling hill. Forests and fields grew all around Like a roaring ocean’s ebb and tide.
Many a deer became your friend And yes, some people loved you too, But now at last you may get cut In spite along with your very hill and all.
Thus I came by with a heavy heart My hand reached out to touch your bark And you opened up your heart and spoke Swept me off my feet and flew Through a vortex of a gate we spun And the world fell far away.
“It’s all right the way it is!” Thundered your might voice With profound acceptance of it all Boundless appreciation and deepest love For all life and everything and all.
“Maybe it’s my time to go, it matters not I’ve been here for quite a while I won’t mind somewhere else to go — And when we’re ready it will be Definitely a good step after all. So, why worry? — Let it be!”
“At times you may feel squeezed, Sometimes crowded, then alone — Go with the flow, ride the ebb and tide And all is right, the very best In everything and all there is This moment, sweet and sound We call eternity and love!”
So the tree spoke with silence Like thunder shaking up my Earth Then gently put me back again Down on my little human feet.
“Christina’s Theme” — cooperation of sound and light
And I asked him if it was true. “True?” he snapped. “What do you mean by by ‘true’? You want to know if it happened, word for word, exactly as I told it? Makes no difference. You may as well ask me if it’s a good story, because a good story is true, whether it happened or not. And a bad story — even if it happened — is a lie.” “The question,” he added with a grin, “is not whether the story is true, but whether it has truth inside it… And that is a mystery only time can solve.” — p. 9
As Mark Twain said: “Truth is stranger than fiction… Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.” — p. 10
“But telling stories is not about the words you say. When you have a story inside you, and an open heart, you become a conduit — the story flows through you. As for the words — ” he waved a hand dismissively, “they’re merely commentary.” — pp. 93-94
From The Beggar King and the Secret of Happiness by Joel ben Izzy
The January 2022 tonality of the month is Aeolian (natural minor), a diatonic heptatonality.
1) Aeolian — very calm sound sample — Dec. 2021 — 3:30 loop — plays until stopped or you go to another page on this tab2) Aeolian — calm sound sample — December 2021 — 2:28 loop 3) Aeolian — rhythmic sound sample — December 2021 — 2:44 loop4) Aeolian — short rhythmic sound sample — June 2020 — 0:40 loop
The tonality of the month of January 2022 is Aeolian (natural minor), a regular diatonic heptatonality that is fully anchored. The octave of the diatonic tonality matrix includes five whole steps and two half steps (or semitones). And either two or three consecutive whole steps, a pair and a trio, alternate in separating the two individual half steps from each other.
You may enjoy a sound sample loop, such as the one of the tonality of the month, as sound mantra for contemplation or meditation, for upliftment, focusing, or simply for relaxation and regeneration as soothing background sound. Further, you could hum or chant along, for example using Ōṁ / Aum ॐ, HU, or another mantra syllable that suits you, and tune yourself to the fundamental.
The miracle of the present moment — December 2021 — near Grächwil / Meikirch, Switzerland
This December 2021 Tonalibus update extends an invitation to an upcoming concert in Basel on February 10. Further, it announces the Fidibus shop release of playlists for free continual listening. And it touches on the completion of the catalogue of tonalities and the expansion of the glossary. Finally, an inspiring quote concludes this Tonalibus update.
Invitation to a cooperation concert in Basel, Switzerland
(More info and program highlights forthcoming in January.)
Fidibus shop news: Free playlists
Tonalibus playlists offer easy and free continual listening and downloading of individual pieces. Tune in and enjoy!
The playlists offered at this time in the Fidibus shop are:
High mountains on fire, light, and sound — playlist Tonalibus D — so far: five new pieces, 33 minutes — a work in progress, accumulating like snow on the mountains
Riding the wave’s crest — playlist Tonalibus C — ten pieces, mid 2021, 67 minutes
Relishing the present — playlist Tonalibus B — nine pieces, early 2021, 45 minutes
Creative joy of a new life — playlist Tonalibus A — twelve pieces, 2020, 39 minutes
Tonalibus news: Catalogue completion
The Tonalibus catalogue of anchored tonalities, after all, appears reasonably complete with its eighty entries. A recent concluding addition was the TetraNa progression. Besides the previously announced tonality TetraNa, this progression presents the three TetraNa inversions: Norcor, Locor, and Upcor.
“Inversion progression, from here to there and back” — 8-string guitar, bass, Tibetan (tingsha) cymbal pair — TetraNa inversion Norcor, progression to Dorian via PentaMinLa / Pentabal and back — 7:26 — as loop on a separate tab — TetraNa progression visuals and plain sound samples you find on the page TetraNa progression
Harmony is when opposites meet and circles close in unity — while remaining open-ended. The TetraNa progression exemplifies this quite visibly in its relative simplicity.
TetraNa, as tetratonality, spans only four notes, the fundamental and initial three overtones of the harmonic series. This progression rounds off the Tonalibus catalogue of tonalities, after growing to a considerable number of entries. It unifies the overtone foundation with pattern progression, full and partial, progressive and regressive, as well as anchored and to some extent also not anchored.
Harmony in its widest sense includes and remains open to everything and all. This progression stands for how the Tonalibus catalogue is to remain open-ended after reaching some level of completeness of something that in its entirety will always escape complete human grasp, will always be greater and go further — harmony, here in its expression as myriad of anchored tonalities.
Tonalibus news: Glossary expansion
The glossary defines basic and unique terms and names used by Tonalibus. It is the first option under Concepts in the top menu or on the Concepts page. Now it includes also the various key syllables used by Tonalibus in tonality names. Thus, a tonality name can express the inherent structure of the corresponding tonality.
The terms in the glossary are ordered alphabetically. However, this order differs from one language to another. This website automatically pulls up the version corresponding to the language of your system or your geographic location, e.g., with the links mentioned above. With the following links though you may see the different language specific glossary versions. The glossary in English translates to German, French, and Italian but keeps the alphabetic order of the terms in English. While the versions of the glossary in German, in French, and in Italian remain in the given language and list the terms in proper alphabetic order accordingly.
Spiritualibus quote
“The essential nature of words is, therefore, neither exhausted by their present meaning, nor is their importance confined to their usefulness as transmitters of thoughts and ideas; but they express, at the time, qualities which are not translatable into concepts. This is like a melody which, though it may be associated with a deep meaning, cannot be described by words or by any other medium of expression. It is that irrational quality which stirs up our deepest feelings, elevates our innermost being, and makes it vibrate with those with whom we are closely related in love and work.”
“All that is visible clings to the invisible, the audible to the inaudible, the tangible to the intangible, and, of course, the thinkable to the unthinkable.”
— The Shariyat-Ki-Sugmad, Books One & Two, Paul Twitchell, pp. 414-415
Happy holidays and the best 2022!
The miracle of the present moment — December 2021 — near Grächwil / Meikirch, Switzerland
