Tibetan sacred music and dance
In Tibet, whenever a monastery celebrated a spiritual festival, people from the surrounding villages and nomadic tribes would assemble in the courtyard for the three or four days of sacred music and dance. From their monastery-in-exile in South India, monks of the Drepung Loseling Monastery have the honor of leading the Monlam Chenmo, Tibet's largest national sacred music festival. A group of eleven lamas from the Drepung Loseling Monastery brings this tradition to this year's festival with a program entitled "The Mystical Arts of Tibet." Performances will feature the monks' unique multiphonic singing style, together with traditional temple instruments such as cymbals, bells, drums, long horn trumpets, and high horns. Their repertoire of masked dances includes the Dance of the Celestial Travelers, the Dance of the Sacred Snow Lion, the Skeleton Dance, and the Dance of the Black Hat Masters. The Drepung monks are particularly renowned for their cultivation of the unique Tibetan multiphonic singing known as zokkay (low tone) and barda (high tone). In this style, also known as "overtone singing," each of the main chantmasters simultaneously intones three notes, thus each individually creating a complete chord. Practitioners learn to control their vocal apparatus in such a way as to cause certain natural overtones or "harmonics" of a primary tone to resonate sympathetically while they sing. In effect, the body is transformed into an efficient overtone amplifier. Every six months, a new group of monks will embark on tour as the preceding group returns home to the monastery. All proceeds from their touring benefit the Tibetan refugee community.
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