The auditorium is full. There is excitement in the air – a looking forward to two hours of magical music and magnificent movement. The reputation of the performers ensure an expectation that prompt the hushing of voices when the performance bell rings. As the curtains begin to rise, the audience turn their entire attention to the stage. The lights come on to reveal a well decorated stage with the vocalist and his accompanying artistes seated on one side giving ample space for the dancers to spread well across the dais. The whole auditorium resounds with applause. Such is the way of the world – when the calibre of the artiste is so evolved, applause is showered before the recital. As the applause dies down, there is a deeper silence, a deep concentration not merely by the performers but also the listeners. The tanpura strings start the show. The plucked strings resonate tuning not merely the performers, but deep within the hearts of the audience creating a consonance between performer and listener.
God: I don’t wish to sound rude my child, but I am so glad they are not using the electronic tanpura…
Science: So am I Father! After all, the electronic tanpura was merely innovated to ensure solitary practice by the artiste is feasible. It can never replace the real strings of the tanpura or the effect of the bridge that acts like a sonic prism. Just as a prism will refract white light in the various colours of the rainbow, a tampura bridge refracts the constituent harmonics of the fundamental tones. The tanpura is very responsive; at the touch of one string all others will vibrate in sympathetic resonance.
God: It also creates a resonance in the listeners’ mind. (With a tender smile) Watch the way their heads sway in tune with the music and their feet tap in time with the dance…
The show was reaching its crescendo. The dancers were graceful and yet powerful – a beautiful combination that gave precision and delicacy to the whole show. As the final notes were played and the last movements performed, the audience held their breath. As the notes faded, they even forgot to clap – such was the power of their involvement with the show. Silence is the only language of awe!
Science: That was really fabulous! Wow! How well the audience got involved with the show…
God: The true success of the show is in the merging of the performer and the audience. Do you realise how that happens?
Science: Music and dance have the ability to evoke senso-motor resonances in both performer and listener. The acts of playing and listening to music represent two types of experience similar to each other. Research on the ‘mirror neurons’ shows the existence of a neural mechanism that map directly the expression of others’ actions on to the motor representation of the same actions in the observer’s brain. That is, we resonate exactly with actions taken by others because the mirror neurons discharge both when we perform an action and when we see it performed by someone else.
God: ‘Mirror neurons’ eh? What exactly do they do?
Science: Mirror neurons are a special class of brain cells that fire not only when an individual performs an action, but also when the individual observes someone else make the same movement. Before discovering these mirror neurons, scientists believed that the brains use logical thought processes to interpret and predict other people’s actions. But this discovery is making humanity believe that we understand others not by thinking but by feeling. This is because mirror neurons let us simulate not just other people’s actions, but the intensions and emotions behind those actions. For instance when you see someone smiling, it fires the mirror neurons in the observer on how smiling feels. You don’t have to think why the other is smiling. You simply experience the beauty of smiling immediately.
God: Interesting… Now, is that why the involvement of the audience in the performance is directly related to their own interaction with that kind of activity? People seem to like certain types of music and get involved only in those specifics…
Science: Father! The word resonance comes from the Latin word resonare, meaning “to return to sound”. When we sound an object such as a bell, it continues to ring or resonate the original sound. When another object with qualities of the same pitch as the bell begins to vibrate with the original bell, it is called sympathetic resonance. In a similar way, when the listener is involved in the music, it resonates in his heart binding him to the performer.
God: Ah Yes! Sympathetic resonance is what actually makes this world what it is.
Science: (Watching the Lord keenly) Will you please expand Father?
God: Oh yes I will. But first tell me what you observe as sympathetic resonance.
Science: It is easiest to explain with music. Most Indian plucked string instruments manifest this principle. The Sitar, for instance has auxiliary strings that are not directly played by the performer but which resonate when the main strings are played. For instance, if the sustain pedal is weighted in a piano (so that its dampers which silence the strings are raised and inactive), and a trumpet is sounded near the piano, the strings corresponding to the trumpet tones will begin to reverberate in the piano. This is sympathetic resonance.
God: (With a smile) It does have a more common place occurrence than even musical instruments! How about the window panes that rattle at the powerful sound of a stationery truck engine?
Science: Yes of course Father! Sympathetic vibrations occur based on the room acoustics in the rattling of window panes, light shades and movable panels. Tuning forks are the easiest way to see this phenomenon in action. Two similar tuning-forks are taken, one is mounted on a wooden box. When the other is struck and then placed on the box, then muted, the un-struck mounted fork will begin to vibrate and produce the same sound. So when sufficient harmonic relations exist between vibratory modes, they will respond to the external vibrations.
God: Precisely! So it is not that all strings will vibrate when one is plucked; they need to be ‘in tune’ with each other to experience sympathetic resonance. The audience response to a musical performance is revealed by the listener’s ability of mime or mimic the performer, which allows him to take part, even unintentionally, in the musical act as a whole.
Science: History of human evolution shows how ‘imitation’ is the fundamental prerequisite for the development of social abilities, such as understanding other’s emotions. The ‘mirror neurons’ help recreate other people’s intentions inside the observer’s brain and allows him to understand their emotional state thereby creating empathy.
God: My dear, Silence is the highest vibration available to mankind. Silence is not merely the absence of sound or for that matter your head voice – your thoughts. Silence is before sound, beyond sound… un-manifest, deep, pure… To explain simply – you know what it feels like to be a human being. Silence is the experience of knowing the potential before manifesting as anything. It is ‘home’. Don’t you want to go home, my dear?
Science remained entranced, deeply tuned in to the Father’s voice.
God: Silence can be achieved very easily by all. It is not the prerogative of only a select few. The process is truly simple. Like a sympathetic string, tune yourself to the same frequency of your Guru. When the Master plays the strings, the sympathetic strings resonate too. As my instrument, every action of your Guru, will kindle a sympathetic resonance in you. As your guru drinks into my bosom of silence, you will bask in the same resounding vibration of silence. He will carry you through…
Written by Gita Krishna Raj | Published in infinithoughts in June 2012
When Science met God… | Segment Five: Why Me? | Chapter Seven: Carry me through
