Meditation Bowls
These Sounding Bowls are specifically designed for meditation, though some of my customers now also use them in therapy or healing situations.
Sounding Bowls are unique in the history of world instruments partly because their strings run within the resonant space, where previous instruments have them running above it. For me this placement is allegorical for the coming-in of individual consciousness where we learn to become who we truly are instead of a member of a group.
In the Meditation Bowls the string leads from this inner space to the outside, as if to form a link between the spirit in the individual and the Spirit of the Cosmos.
The form of any bowl can be seen as an image of the soul: It possesses an inner space, a facing edge or rim, and a partially unseen outer form, including the base that rests on the ground. The soul has its inner space, a face it projects to society, and a partly seen and known, partly unknown relationship with the natural world by which it is supported. In the Meditation Bowl the outer shape curves over to become the rim and dips into the inside as though our self conscious aspect has become united with our natural being to enter and enrich our inner being.
Meditation Bowl is attentively hand sculptured, totally unique and not a product of automated processes. The wood is sourced from local trees, often wind-felled and not from clear-felled or imported timber.
The smallest are about 7 inches across and have just one string. A wide range of notes is possible with this and many people have found them useful for sound meditations.
Two string Meditation Bowls additionally create variable harmonics to allow an experience of the Space Between or of the tension and resolution that underlies all music.
Three string Meditation Bowls celebrate the threefold aspects of existence: Head Heart and Limbs, the Red, White and Black, or the Trinity, for example.
I have recently made four and five string ones for people working to Rudolf Steiner’s tonal meditations intended to assist a deeper working, fuller relationship of spirit and body. (Copies of these meditations available here)
Please do phone me to discuss any ideas you may have or questions you would like to share.
