Report on CYTA Zoom session – Jan 25th 2025
‘Mantras for Health’ with Alison Dyke
Report by Sue Hargreaves, CYTA General Secretary.
Alison gave us a short insight into the benefits of chanting , explaining that not only does it develop the breath and settle the mind by requiring total focus, but is a good preparation for meditation. With practice it moves us from our ‘outside’ to our ‘centre’ , our essence, and links to Brahman. Some Mantras are chanted in different ways , such as the Gayatri mantra. Alison’s own teacher has said that here we tend to chant for meditation rather than for religious reasons.
We had handouts to explain some of the rules of pitch, length, effort, and pronunciation and the 12 verse Laghunyasah chant we were practising. She had chosen this one as it has many repetitions. She also explained that we were following a Vedic method with the 3 pitches – lower, upper and both within one note . Also, that sounds come from various parts of the mouth e.g. the sound ‘s’ is produced from 3 places.
We began with connecting with the breath to settle the body , moving onto humming and then all the vowel sounds, continuing with a simple chant that worked through the 3 pitches. Alison then chanted the first 4 verses and then repeated each line in turn which we then repeated twice. The 3 line refrain was in each verse and so it became easier to establish and she continued by chanting the first lines of the verse again, for us to repeat. This was followed throughout the 12 verses. She concluded with us sitting quietly whilst she chanted the whole mantra we had practised, plus 4 lines of verse which we had not had enough time to experience.
I found that it required a lot of concentration and that the longer first line of the verse was the most difficult part. I agree with Alison that working on a one to one basis is ideal, and that working in a ‘live’ group would be encouraging, as the other participants would carry you along. It reminded me of the ease of singing in church, in either Latin or English, that comes with being in a congregation.
Thank you goes to Alison and our Zoom hosts , Chris & Kathryn , and thanks to those of you who were brave enough to dip your toes in – there is a lot to learn and maybe this taster may lead some of us to explore further ?
Sue Hargreaves
The notes which Alison provided for this class are available below for you to download: