Do you know of some cymatics related music, either a band using cymatics as inspiration, tracks called cymatics, or music that is used in creating cymatics art pieces?

If it’s music and it’s related to cymatics in some way, we want to hear about it!

I am currently helping to create a “cymatics channel” so that people interested in cymatics and music can go find everything out there all in one place, browse through it and find what they like.

Here’s what to do:

Submit any tips or links to websites, bands, tracks, or musical cymatics projects to me here in the comments section below.

If you would like to submit audio files or videos, you can do so at the School of Cymatics

You can also become a member of the School of Cymatics and create your own page for sharing cymatics projects and passions – if you haven’t done so yet, please do! We have over 200 members at the school so far and would love to have you join us.

Thank you, and I can’t wait to see (and hear) your ideas for adding to a “cymatics music channel”!

-Jodina

P.S. The photo above is of myself playing a handheld cymatic plate. If you would like to learn how to build a similar cymatic plate to play, you can get full instructions here.

This is a cymatics video test I did for my last project, I was using a wave driver, small amp and an iphone app called the Oscillator 1.1.1 to create these cymatics images.

There are a few iphone apps that you can use to create frequency tones, but this one has produced the best results for me so far using this setup. The only problem is when someone calls me in the middle of doing a cymatics video!

PS If you’d like to get free cymatics video directions for making a cymatic sounder to see your voice, you can download them here.

Cymatics now has a place in a Cirque Du Soleil show!

Over the past few months I have been working on a cymatics commission for Cirque Du Soleil, a film clip of cymatics footage to be used in the new show “TOTEM.”

The finished cymatics piece has been approved and is now in TOTEM, which is currently playing in the Netherlands. It will be coming back to the United States this spring.

I worked with Pedro Pires, the “image content designer” for the show. It was an honor to work with Pedro who has won an Emmy for outstanding visual effects and was artistic director of visual effects for the film The Red Violin. You can hear him talking about creating images for TOTEM in the video clip above.

The cymatics images I created for Cirque Du Soleil involved a circular cymatics plate with salt, vibrated by a wave driver. The images needed to have sufficient resolution to be projected about 20 feet in width, down into the ring and over the performers in the show.

It is exciting to know that cymatics is now featured in an international Cirque Du Soleil show, to be seen by thousands of people around the world over the next few years.

-Jodina Meehan

If you would like to learn how to create circular cymatics images with your voice, click here for free instructions.

cymatics poster included in course

All you have to do is type in your name and email in the upper right hand corner of this page, and you could be the 500th. You will get a 10 part cymatic course including materials lists and step-by-step video lessons including:

> How to build a Chladni style cymatics plate start to finish
> How to play your new plate with a violin bow
> How to build a hand held cymatics plate
> How to make a cymatics carrying case
> Printable cymatics art poster
> and lots more…

Plus you’ll be an official member of the Journal of Cymatics, so you’ll get up-to-date insider information about the latest cymatics news and how-tos all year…totally free.

Good Luck!

P.S. If you’re not super lucky today and you don’t win (or maybe you just don’t want to wait to get your course) you can simply get one today by clicking here. (Order your free cymatic sounder instructions there and you will see the cymatic plate course immediately afterward).

Lily Peirce With Her Blue Ribbon

Lily has this to say about how she got started doing vibration experiments and her winning cymatics entry in the science fair:

“I saw a video on Youtube of people doing Cymatic experiments with sand on a plate. I also saw a video of Cymatics with corn starch.
I got interested from seeing the clouds formed from our Cymatic experiments.

“My project included: On my iBook I used ToneGen to produce the signal to the amplifier and then to the speakers. On one speaker I had a piece of matt board attached and on the other speaker I had a bowl of water attached. My video camera and brother’s iMac was used as a monitor so the people could see my Cymascope.”

The Journal of Cymatics congratulates Lily on her successful cymatics vibration experiments, and encourages all parents, teachers and students interested in learning about cymatics with sound waves lesson plans to be inspired by Lily’s work.

Here is a photo from Lily’s “cymascope” of a cymatics pattern created during the playing of “Dear Prudence” by the Beatles.

Beatles Cymatics! photo courtesy Eric Peirce

Great work and excellent cymatics documentation, Lily!

You can get your own sound waves lesson plans here, and you can download a free video instructions for making a simple cymatics sounder that kids can build to conduct their own DIY cymatics vibration experiments here.

Find more videos like this on School of Cymatics
The School of Cymatics has officially opened it’s doors with it’s first virtual classroom lesson “Cymatics 101″ going live today. The school already has 67 members and the doors are currently still open for free admission.

“Cymatics 101, Part I” is the first in a series of new “5 minute classes” that give students an easy way to learn about cymatics one lesson at a time. Each lesson includes a cymatics science fact, a cymatics art demo, featured correspondence from the “cymatics mailbag” and a quote from cymatics history. There will be more virtual classroom lessons as the video series is recorded, and you can be first to be notified of new video lessons in the series by enrolling at the School of Cymatics.

Inside the School of Cymatics you can watch cymatics video lessons, see what cymatics projects other students of cymatics are working on, view new cymatics images and beautiful cymatics photos, see cymatics videos by our students, and network with other “cymatic fanatics” around the world.

You can also see all the best cymatics YouTube videos all in one place streaming live at the School of Cymatics, by clicking on the “cymatics videos” tab once you are there.

If you have content that you would like to see included in the School of Cymatics curriculum, please first become a member of the Journal of Cymatics (enter your name and email in the upper right hand corner of this site), then leave a comment below, or write to me at the School of Cymatics.

Sound healing is closely tied to cymatics, and in fact I met several M.D. practitioners of sound healing at the Cymatics Conference in Atlanta.

Sound healing practitioners use cymatics, not necessarily in the sense that they are making sound visible (as with cymatics and art), but in that they apply sound to matter in order to shape and change it. For example a sound healing practitioner might use sound applied to the human body, and in recent years there has been an emphasis on scientifically record and report on the results achieved using cymatics for sound healing.

These sound healing practitioners range from doctors to chiropractors to yoga teachers, who state that using cymatics for sound healing often generates results that no other therapy could achieve. Some use highly researched frequencies stored and generated on a machine with specific frequencies recommended for specific diagnoses; others use their own voice and a more intuitive approach to sound healing.

If you are interested in learning more about cymatics and sound healing, here are three good places to start. I met all three of the following practitioners in person at the Cymatics Conference in 2008 and they are great resources for sound healing information:

John Beaulieu is the author of “Music and Sound in the Healing Arts” and uses tuning forks among other techniques for sound healing. Dr. Beaulieu also has a “BioSonics sound school” where you can learn about sound healing yourself. Watch my video interview with Dr. Beaulieu here.

Dr. June Leslie Wieder, Doctor of Chiropractic and author of “Sound of the Spine,” focuses on the “resonance of the spine” and applying specific vibrational frequencies directly to the vertebrae. Watch my video interview with Dr. Wieder here.

Mandara Cromwell is President of Cymatherapy® International, and Director of the Board of the International Sound Therapy Association (ISTA), and director of the International Conference on Cymatics. Her focus is the use of a machine called the Cyma®1000, which generates specific sound frequencies. You can learn more about Mandara Cromwell’s work here.

This is a clip that John Stuart Reid just sent me of a cymatics demonstration at the International Sound Healing Conference. Watch it and you will see the cymatics form of throat singing (overtone singing), a dove, a coyote, and a cello, as well as others.

In the video John is doing the speaking, and Erik Larson can be seen standing to his left. John and Erik are co-creators of the world’s first CymaScope, which you can also see in front of the film screen.

You may remember from previous posts that John Stuart Reid is working to create a “dolphin alphabet” using images from cymatics. He has also informed me that he has recently completed an image of the “song of the sun” which was recorded by the SOHO spacecraft, then transferred to the CymaScope to create the image. I will be featuring this image soon so keep your eye out!

P.S. You can build your own DIY cymatics device to see sounds similar to the footage you see here in about 30 minutes. Download free instructions here.

On the popular TV show “Heroes,” the character called Emma Coolidge is portrayed as being able to “see sound” as her “superpower.”

The theory has ties to cymatics in that sound is represented as sound waves being viewed as visual patterns – but how much the authors of the show understand about cymatics is unclear. Take a look at the photos of Emma from Heroes “seeing sound,” then take a look at the picture of the cymatics sound bubble around a woman playing a violin here. Did they get it right? Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

See more photos of how Emma Coolidge “sees sound” on Heroes, on the Heroes Wiki page…and, if you want, you can even add a “theory” about Emma and cymatics to the “Theories” part of the Heros Wiki. Be sure to leave a link to http://www.cymatica.com when you do (so they can see what you are talking about).

Whether you are interested in the physics of sound yourself, or want to teach about the physics of sound waves for kids, one of the best ways to experience sound waves firsthand is to play a cymatics plate and see the sand or salt transform from chaos into geometric patterns formed by sound vibrations right in front of your eyes.

The of Cymatics will be making a video course available on “how to make a DIY cymatics plate” for those who want to build a Chladni-style cymatics plate of their own.

In the meantime, for those who already have (or are building) a DIY cymatics plate and have had some difficulty learning to get the sound vibrations going properly, here are some tips for playing your cymatics plate, and a set of cymatics images that will illustrate some tips on playing a cymatics plate visually for you:

Tip #1: Make sure the surface of the cymatics plate is smooth and free of obstructions or “stickiness.” There are two things you can do to reduce resistance on a cymatics plate surface. One, wipe the surface with a ’static cling’ dryer sheet (like Bounce) to remove any static electricity. Two, take a bit of the powder crystals you are using for cymatics patterns and put some on the surface of the plate, then take a soft cloth and polish the plate lightly with them, before cleaning the plate and applying sound waves.

Tip #2: Make sure your bow is tightened enough. I personally tighten my bow with a pair of pliers, but be careful not to tighten it until it breaks. Also, be sure to loosen your bow afterwards and never leave it tight when you put it away.

Tip #3: Be sure you have enough rosin on your bow. You want to have a really good coating, and you can recoat it each time you play to increase stickiness. In my experience, the more stickiness, the better the cymatics images you will get.

Tip #4: Hold the bow very firmly and press in on the edge of the plate very hard, then pull slowly and firmly, not quickly and lightly, along the edge of the cymatics plate. Get the bow to “catch” and the vibrations to start, then keep going, keeping your bow hard against the cymatics plate’s edge.

Tip #5: Use a sieve to pour your salt or sand through onto your cymatics plate before you play. This give you a nice, even coating of particles to start with, and eliminate any “pouring pattern” that gets left from applying particles by hand, which might show up in your cymatics design and make it less “pure.”

Click on this set of cymatics images to see the tips I’ve offered here illustrated in photos.

And be sure to put your name in for a subscription to the Journal of Cymatics in the upper right hand corner here, so you can get an announcement as soon as the new “cymatics how to” plate instructions become available.