The ancient art of chanting has long been embraced by the world's great religious traditions as a path to healing and enlightenment, but only recently has Western science begun to recognize its therapeutic effects on the body and mind. Chanting provides a fascinating introduction to this powerful and increasingly popular practice and shows you how to use chant in your own life as a powerful tool for relaxation, body-mind healing, and spiritual self-discovery. Drawing on Robert Gass's own experience as one of the world's best-known leaders of contemporary chant, as well as the wisdom of sound healers from around the world, Chanting explores the science of how sound affects both our bodies and our consciousness and takes us on an engaging tour of chant as it is used in Hindu, Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Islamic, African, Shamanic, Goddess, and Native American traditions. Chanting provides simple exercises and more than twenty musical scores to help you develop a personalized chanting practice that can fuel everyday activities with purpose and meaning.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
"The word enchantment suggests becoming one with God through chanting. Robert Gass has achieved this with his own chants and music and guides the reader toward the same in this clear and enlightening explanation of how to develop your own personal practice." -Deepak Chopra, MD, author of The Path to Love
"One of the masters of transformational music has written a masterful introduction to the spiritual path of chanting. The spirit and sounds of millennia are captured here in this profound and practical book. " -Jean Houston, author of A Passion for the Possible
"In Chanting, Robert Gass speaks as a poet, a musician, a storyteller, and a healer. Read Chanting and you will be inspired, as I am, to sing in a way that gives sacred meaning to every aspect of your life." -Margot Anand, author of The Art of Sexual Ecstasy and The Art of Everyday Ecstasy
"This is a beautiful book about the discovery of spirit in all of our live. Harmonious sounds can open the door to a new level of living. As I read Robbie's book I began to chant, 'Yes, Yes, Yes' because so many of us never hear the voice of the spirit when we are surrounded by thenoises of the modern world. Read so hat you may listen to the sounds of inner silence and the music of life." -Bernie Siegel, MD, author of Love, Medicine & Miracles and Prescriptions for Living
"Skillfully initiates and entrains the reader into the marvelous universe of sound and its healing properties. This book evolves and explains what our cells, our bones, and psyches already know, long for, and have so commonly lost. Allow yourself to become enchanted and re-enchanted!" -Jon Kabat-Zinn, author of Wherever You Go, There You Are
"Chanting is one of the most powerful ways I know to awaken the heart and evoke spirit. Through beautiful sotries and evocative images, Robert Gass brings the magic of chant to life in this book that is at once informative, warm, enlivening, and deeply spiritual." -Joan Borysenko, MD, author of Fire in the Soul
