Cynthia Snodgrass

Cynthia has devoted herself to the sacred sounds of Sanskrit, having trained extensively at the American Sanskrit Institute, where she is the Senior Instructor, and at Harvard University. She is founder of the Sacred Sound Institute, a non-profit organization dedicated to education and advocacy concerning the spiritually-therapeutic benefits of sacred sound and music. She is author of The Sonic Thread: Sound as a Pathway to Spirituality and producer/artist on Waters from the Son/Waters from the Moon: An Altar of Sound and Dream Chants, CDs that combine Gregorian chant from the West and Sanskrit chants from the East. She has recently inititated the Essential Sanskrit Series (Vol. I Essential Sanskrit for Yoga Posture Pronunciation; Vol. II Sanskrit Prayers and Invocations).


Sanskrit: Sacred Weavings of Ritual Sound
Ancient poet-sages of the Rig Veda speak of the universe as a closely inter-connected net of relations, created from the divine energies of Sanskrit sound. To know these energies is to know Divine. These sounds, intoned in outward ritual, weave together the worlds of earth and heaven. Later tantric practitioners employ the same Sanskrit sounds to perfrom inner rituals of purification, enlightenment, and release. The practices of Vedic and Indic mantra are ancient, varied and profound.

All mantra is grounded in the Sanskrit alphabet and its sounds. This workshop will teach the energetics of the Sanskrit, its basic positionings and proper pronunciation. It will also offer the opportunity of chanting with the seed syllables (mantras) of the alphabet in an experiential practice of sound meditation.

Goals:
To have a fundamental understanding of the energetics of the Sanskrit alphabet.

Learning Objectives:
• Learn how the sounds of the Sanskrit alphabet provide underlying support for all mantra,
• Experience how the vibrations of the seed mantras effect the energetics of the physical, emotional, and spiritual bodies, and
• Experience the Sanskrit language as a vehicle for transcendence and enlightenment.

Saturday, November 11, 2006
Ballroom 10:45 am to noon

www.sacredsoundinstitute.org