breath was the first drummer...

Humankind did not invent music... music was already in Nature. Motion gives arising to all sound.

The motion of the wind. The motion of the waters. The motion of the stones. The motion in the fire. The wind alone is an entire orchestra. The motion of the body, all of its internal noises.

​Music is a mirror we hold up to ourselves. In it we see reflected everything we have ever experienced. We see the world around us. We see ourselves. We can see how we listen. We can see how we pay attention. We experience presence. We can see how we make love. We see how we evolve. We can see how we dance...

Dance in a circle, the shape of the drum, the shape of the world. The first drum, the human body, with its senses and its rhythms, then the world, with its endless variety of sounds and rhythms. Lightning-flash, winds blowing and the rain drops falling into a small pool. The senses sense nature, and have their arising from that very nature that they are sensing. Nature's way of realizing itself. And yet what is it that is actually experiencing the sensing?

The listener; did this consciousness come from nature too? A way to sense the sensing? The Earth has taught us all we know about music. It has given us its music. It gives us the tools to make its music. In every sound there is music. Visitors from space bring the earth new songs. They come as beautiful stones of every kind. The universe and the earth make love in this way and they sing together. They have taught us their song in this way. The scratching cicada is the sound of the medicine rattle and our hearts drum out the rhythm as we are giving thanks through appreciation for life itself...

In this way we have learned to play the drum. In this way we have learned to sing, dance and make love. It is all a response, a response to life and being alive in the world. It is the song our parents want us to sing. It is the dance our parents dance. They have taught us this out of love. We are in love when we play music and when we dance. This makes everyone happy. Being in love this way reminds us of our source and there is great joy. The music flows like a flag in the wind and the dance is like that of birds or deer. We play this music and the world listens, impartially, for to nature, it is just another passage in an endless stream of music...

For nature, the entire universe is its symphony, its orchestra and its audience.........

*Excerpted from Breath Was the First Drummer: A Treatise on Drums, Drumming and Drummers by Dru Kristel

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