Kepandung Sita ("The Abduction of Sita"). Performed by ensemble Sekaa Kecak Puspita Jaya, Ulapan I, Becahkiuh, Badung.

Kecak energy

𝔇𝔢𝔫𝔦𝔰 𝔊𝔞𝔲𝔩𝔱𝔦𝔢𝔯 lute music 1-octave below

"Played outside the monastery at sunrise to attract the attention of the gods and goddesses from their usual work so that they will take heed of the lamas in their puja during the daytime."

Tibetan horns

Folk Music Of The Western Congo

Bapindi hunting calls

Ancient water consciousness, signals, communications and activity observed from within the earth's womb below the Antarctic ice at PALAOA. Audio stream files from July 1st compiled direct from the acoustic records @ https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.844106?format=html

Underwater Antarctic Soundscape at PALAOA, July 1st

Westhampton, Massachusetts forest, 11:45pm-6:3Oam

Recorded from http://acoustics.safeproject.net/06:00/3/36068?t=0.1444

Borneo rainforest dawn | 5:43-6:29AM, 4°42'40.25'' N 117°37'8.36'' E

Recorded from http://acoustics.safeproject.net/18:00/10/51395?t=0.6991

Borneo rainforest dusk | 6-7:37PM, 4°39'51.96'' N 117°32'6.48'' E

Listening with headphones recommended! Recorded in 4-channel surround sound from within the circle and the loft above. Video: https://youtu.be/aLPOiKQsl40
~
Everything speaks. Everything is language, consciousness, shapes, conveyance, encoded reason. We are conductors of perception and play in reality, physical orchestrators of communications channeling, bridging worlds which meet through our cognizance. Improviser = composer = improviser = composer… Our practice is exploration, duration, hold, threshold, space, choice, interaction, non interaction, dynamics, energy, body. Amounts of things. Touch. There is no turning back from the experiences and exposures which evolve the love and flow and articulation of our being and awareness. We continually curate the galleries of our mind, this dream we each are in the universe. A seance of world premiere meetings. Such is meditation too. It is beyond words, and yet we know it. How far can we go? We honor life, this opportunity of existence and healing we’re given. We use it and sing it through. Our life is cosmic synchronicity made manifest.

Video

14-speaker live nature music sound collage meditation

Coils

Just another day in place dawning again and again if perceived or not, recorded within some bushes beneath a tree, 11 April 2023. Den-en-chōfu, Ota City, Tokyo. 
35°35'35.5"N 139°39'48.2"E

多摩川台公園 Tamagawadai Park ✾ 5-10:30am springtime ambience

𝌃𝌄𝌅𝌁𝌂 ° ₂₀₀₉ ᶰʸᶜ ᵖ ͥ ͣ ᶰ ͦ

5 unexpected combinations for 3 pairs of wireless speakers in the dry Ojai riverbed

Translated from the Japanese in the album booklet: 
' ' Hojun Nagata, 15th chief priest of Nagakusan Jomanji Temple.
Born in Kitagata-cho, Higashiusuki-gun, Miyazaki Prefecture in 1930, Hojun Nagata lost sight in both eyes as an infant. In 1945, at the age of 13, he entered Jomanji Temple, which has a 300-year history as a temple for blind monks, where he learned sutras and the biwa from the previous chief priest, Kodama Johō. In 1955, he passed the Tokudo examination at Shobozan Jōraku-in, received the precepts, and became a monk of the Tendai sect, "Hōjun.'' Since then, he has worked by visiting each temple in the mountain villages surrounding Nobeoka City, performing blessing prayers and offering prayers to the god of fire, the god of land, and the god of water.
After the death of Chief Priest Kodama in 1981, he became the 15th chief priest and had to visit the remaining 1,000 temples by himself.

 ご祈祷 Go kitō, Prayer. 
This is the most important ritual of blessing prayers to remove impurity from the Dan family's homestead and pray for a good harvest, the safety of the family, good health, and traffic safety. 
A 1-sho mound of rice, a small bowl of water, and a small plate of salt are placed in the tokonoma alcove, and a bamboo twig is added. Nagata sits facing the tokonoma alcove, strikes the bell, massages the beads, and recites a spell. The fingers of both hands are interlaced in a complex manner to form a seal and cut with great spirit. With his right hand, he dips a bamboo twig in a small bowl of water and shakes it in all directions to purify the area. Next, he sprinkles a pinch of salt in the air and scatters a few grains of rice in all directions.
When the rosary, made up of 108 beads, clinks dryly in the hands of the chief priest, an infinite space opens up.
While chanting, "Even though I see all kinds of impurities, I see impurities in my heart...'', the chief priest purifies his own mind and body with the "Rokukon no Wai''.
Next, he purifies the surrounding area by striking the bell and performing the "Five Directions'' in the four directions and the center, and the "Sugatawari'' to purify the Three Treasures of Kojin. There, he prays for the arrival of the gods and Buddha. In order to have his prayers heard, he recites the "Buddhist theory of Great Desolation God," gives the Fukutokuen, Mandai Dharani Sutra, and chants the Heart Sutra.
This will usually take around 30 minutes. Some of these are included here. This recording was made in the main hall of Jomanji Temple, so a large mortar was used as the bell, and Nagata recited the Heart Sutra while beating a drum.
The gohei are freshly cut and offered according to the purpose of the prayer. Nagata skillfully cuts out the intricately shaped gohei with a sharp knife. This is so spectacular that it is hard to believe he is blind.' '

今を生きる琵琶盲僧の世界

Hojun Nagata | ご祈祷 Go kitō (Prayer)

https://youtu.be/NOnlXSz-d48
30 June-1 July 2024

Asker, Norway overnight, 2am-8:30am

ANTONIO GAUDI

Toru Takemitsu's music for the film ANTONIO GAUDÍ by Hiroshi Teshigahara (1984)

https://youtu.be/-NgKRAWVe7E
Peter Serkin, Graf Fortepiano; Santa Barbara City College.
[00:00] 1. Valses Sentimentales Op. 50, No. 13 in A; [01:39] 2. Deutsche Tänze Op. 33, No. 2 in D; [03:00] 3. Deutsche Tänze Op. 33, No. 7 in Bb; [03:58] 4. Twelve Deutsche Tanze Op. 171, No. 5 in D.

Turntable parking garage ☉ Schubert Dances

Goutte d'Or evening ambience energy

海童道 臨暮四題（南から北へ）Kaidōdō – Rinpuku Shidai (Minami kara Kita e)

OBI strip: 
"The world praises him—
The great 'sorcerer of breath' who manifests
the pulsation of the cosmos
and the realm of stillness!"**

[00:00] A1. Twilight of the South (Void’s Twilight) | Minami no Rinpuku (Kokū Rinpuku)
[05:33] is A2. Twilight of the West (Yamato's Twilight) | Nishi no Rinpuku (Yamato Rinpuku)
[13:22] A3. Twilight of the East (Musashi Style) | Higashi no Rinpuku (Musashi Chō)
[22:44] B1. Twilight of the North (Ōshū’s Twilight) | Kita no Rinpuku (Ōshū Rinpuku)
[26:39] B2. Part 2
[36:47] B3. Part 3

All pieces performed and composed by Watazumi Dōso Roshi.
____________________________

Back cover: 

海童道 祖老師 (Kaidōdō Sorōshi) – Elder Master Watazumi Dōso.

臨暮四題（りんぼしだい）
"Four Themes of Approaching Twilight"

This record captures the essence of a spiritual journey through sound—a path through four metaphysical and geographic directions, represented by four musical pieces. These works, composed and performed by Watazumi Dōso, are not mere musical compositions; they are manifestations of practice (gyō), distilled through breath, bamboo, and inner cultivation. This album is titled "Rinpuku Shidai" – Four Themes of Twilight – and each piece corresponds with a cardinal direction and a symbolic quality of transformation, decay, and spiritual revelation.


"Southern Twilight – Twilight of the Void"

The South signifies the beginning—birth, emergence, and the first awakening into life. The piece named “Kokū Rinpuku” (Twilight of the Void) evokes this primal zone. In Zen, “Kokū” (虚空) is the boundless void, formless and spacious, both the origin and the return. From this emptiness, the first breath rises; in this emptiness, the final breath dissolves.

The shakuhachi here begins with a tone as if summoned from a great silence. Its breathy articulation drifts like mist over the southern mountains of Japan, speaking to the ancient past and its perennial freshness. The piece seeks to embody the paradox of fullness within emptiness. To dwell in the southern wind is to remember our origin in the unformed.


"Western Twilight – Yamato's Twilight"

The West is the realm of the sun’s descent, and in traditional Buddhist cosmology, it is associated with the Pure Land—Amida Buddha’s paradise. Here, “Yamato Rinpuku” pays tribute to the Yamato spirit, the ancient cultural heartland of Japan. It is a reverent, noble passage toward dissolution.

This piece is shaped with quiet dignity, restrained yet deeply expressive. Watazumi’s breath navigates the terrain of refinement, tradition, and spiritual longing. Within the tone is the echo of prayers uttered in the twilight, offerings of gratitude to those who came before. The West becomes a gate—not merely to night, but to the luminous field beyond life and form.


"Eastern Twilight – Musashi Mode"

The East, where the sun rises, is paradoxically cast in the motif of twilight in this work. “Musashi Chō,” referencing the province of Musashi (now Tokyo area), is a style Watazumi often associated with martial vigor and spiritual clarity. This piece represents the realm of practice—of sharpening, of heat and motion, of breath as fire.

Here the shakuhachi takes on a fiercer edge. The breath pulses with the rhythm of discipline, of combative stillness honed through decades of spiritual training. The East, as Watazumi evokes it, is not merely the dawn, but the testing ground of awakening—a place where twilight is not an end, but a threshold to transformation.


"Northern Twilight – Twilight of Ōshū"

The North is cold, remote, and deeply spiritual in the Japanese symbolic imagination. “Ōshū” refers to the old region of Tōhoku—northern Honshū—known for its ascetics, mountain sages, and fierce weather. This piece is a descent inward, like snow covering everything in silence.

“Kita no Rinpuku” draws breath into the bones. The shakuhachi becomes a conduit for stillness so complete that time itself pauses. Melodies seem to hang in midair, like frozen dew. Watazumi’s sound dissolves into something beyond personality, beyond self. The player and breath disappear; only sound remains—like wind moving through a pine forest in snow.


解説 (Commentary):
This album is not a performance in the ordinary sense, but a spiritual offering: 道曲吹定 (dōkyoku suitei) – music determined by the Way. Watazumi does not “perform” the shakuhachi; he practices it as part of a greater path of embodiment, breath training, and the harmonizing of spirit and nature.

These four compositions are both deeply personal and universal. They are a record of a journey: from South to North, from life to death, from breath to breathlessness. This is music to be listened to not only with the ears but with the body. It asks for silence in the listener, a stillness that can receive the tones as seeds.

Watazumi Dōso’s presence in these recordings is unmistakable. Every breath, pause, and inflection bears the weight of a life devoted to practice. One does not merely listen to these tracks—one enters them.

▒ Watazumi Dōso – Four Themes of Sunset (From South to North) ▒ (1974)

[00:00] Part I; [02:55] Part II, "Hammerklavier"; [13:24] Part III

Radio bardo ₂₀₁₆ ᶰʸᶜ

A 3O-minute example from the acoustic records of 15 January, 2013, in the underwater/under-ice soundscape at PALAOA. None of these sounds have been treated with effects of any kind. 

Original open-source files here: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.844106

Came across this occurrence for a few days in mid-January. The sounds were pretty much continual all the time, varying in intensity and frequency. I found the same to be the case in other years as well, and also just January. I'd never heard anything quite like it except for this: https://www.youtube.com/user/VoyagerPWS/videos 

From what I gather, these are the "vocalizations" of Ross seals - the rarest of all Antarctic pinnipeds - (see the link at the bottom). Why and how they are doing this is not clear, and probably never really will be.  At most other times during the year what you predominately hear are calls of Weddell, Leopard and Crabeater seals; and occasionally high, rather distant vocalization of what are probably whales. 

After listening to this for a while, feeling it permeate completely through the brainwaves, from the back of my being it's like a memory starts to come forward, as if coming back from a dream... a dream within a dream... The essence of what these sounds are, whatever they are, have something to do with the roots of our existence. All of this in fact. Everything we're hearing. Life on earth wouldn't exist if it weren't for the ocean and what's in it. What's first is on the bottom. The habitats at the deepest part of this planet occur within the sea. What came first? What has continued until today since the beginning? That is cosmic, and for us here, sprouted of earth, everything has evolved from the waters. Our most ancient ancestry. Before life took flight in the sky, it took flight in the water. We all want to fly. We all want to sing, to call, to cry... The universe sings through us, and we are called to live, cried to life. 

http://epic.awi.de/18506/1/Kin2008b.pdf 
_____________________________________________________________________________________

Underwater Antarctic Soundscape at PALAOA | ROSS SEALS

Philips PH-7501|02 - Nov-Dec. 1970 - Fukui Prefecture of Sotoshu Daihonzan Eiheiji [Soto zen monks of Eiheiji Temple]. 

"Zen: Shikantaza - Sotoshu Daihonzan Eiheiji" | Soto zen Eiheiji Temple atmospheres

Frogs, owl, first birds... Recorded direct from live stream: http://mp3s.nc.u-tokyo.ac.jp/OTANOMO_CyberForest.mp3
June 11, 2016.

Shiga Park, Nagano, Japan | 3am to dawn meditation

Compiled with recordings from the Macaulay Library.

Amazing Weddell seal sounds below the Antarctic ice

The Unknown Music of Birds

Sound realities below the Antarctic ice on October 31st.   
https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.844106?format=html

Underwater Antarctic Soundscape at PALAOA - October

Geese flying overhead 2-octaves below

April 4, 2018, Tassajara Canyon, California

Frogs overnight by the pond

via http://locus.creacast.com:9001/rainforest_canopy_mary_cairncross_scenic_reserve.mp3

Green catbird baby sounds

Just another serene and humid daytime reality buzzing in April, tucked into bamboo along a path by the Sarawak river leading to the KuraKura Homestay shangri-la.

Borneo | Kampung Semadang jungle afternoon ambience

Every January I come back to these incredible sounds. I've compiled them here from the PALAOA acoustic records at: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.844106?format=html

PALAOA(PerenniAL Acoustic Observatory in the Antarctic Ocean)is located at Atka Bay, eastern Weddell Sea. Ross seal sightings are scarce around Atka Bay, but their distinct siren-like calls dominate the underwater soundscape from December - February. 

More about the Ross seal underwater calls - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ffj_CNxeu5ShjgLig7hyqtyTOx3fjOw4

꘣ ☽ ◮︒ ◉ ⧟ ⦂ ⬙ ✧

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