Part 2

What were some of the most interesting overtone singing techniques you tried out and what are their respective qualities?

In the beginning I emphasised the overtones a lot, and could not stop singing them. After about 4 years I felt: I can do them all now, so what next? It was sort of perplexing, and a signal that I had to move on, beyond the technique itself, into its possible musical languages.

There are so many ways to sing overtones, and I use all the basic techniques known in different traditions which I now call the seven basic techniques in my book. The ones with the very deep fundamental did get a bit more difficult in recent years. But with some training and practise I can still use them in performance, as I did in the National Concert Hall in Taipei last year in a composition of Hsu Po-Yun.

In many performances I favour the “gong” and “bird” techniques, because they can be combined smoothly. You can use overtones from low to high with having a great disruption somewhere.

Listen to my solo album Paraphony:



In how far has working with overtone singing changed your collaborative practise?

It’s always been there, so no real change. It was more often than not a reason for people to invite me!

I try to integrate it as fluently as possible. First of all, in my own vocal languages, which are manyfold. There isn’t much music I hate. So I integrate overtones into many other ways of singing. And I integrate these various ways of singing into a wide range of styles. From more introspective or acoustic explorations like my solo album Paraphony, to more composed works with my ensemble Parafonia a decade later, which has Early Music and Indian influences amongst others, to concerts and recordings in improv and avant-garde.

The experimental music of Oorbeek is a case in point (latest album: Kavel).



In Taiwan I sang and danced with various dancers and choreographers. In 2002 I helped restore an early Shostakovich work, Odna, employing throat singing from Siberia, and appeared on its first public performance.

Listening to overtones is a powerful sensation. What is it like to sing them?

While getting acquainted with overtones I had many revelatory experiences. It used to be very powerful and sort of addictive for some years. I was a 21 year-old young man becoming conscious of the world at large and of himself. Then it is tempting to assume that the one caused the other, but I have always been cautious to attribute those special experiences to that vocal technique alone. But who knows it brought me there!?

Once I got through that, I had to look for other, deeper layers of listening and singing. By that time all my singing began to bear the traits of a harmonically-charged voice, a voice built on a multiplicity of timbres. That goes much further than what overtone singing can do, as the entire field of timbre gets suffused with harmonic awareness.

So far, the focus with regards to overtone singing has mainly been on sound. But melody is affected, too. How do you personally understand melody and what changes when it becomes part of a richer sonic environment?

Very essential. Not all overtone singers value that or train that. Many are happy as long as the overtones are there. I keep searching for melodic possibilities all the time and enjoy that process immensely. In my continuous absorbtion into music of alles ages and places, melody is inevitably one of the key components, particularly for the singing voice. That process of absorbtion is on-going and will never stop.

In recent years I began learning the Indian systems of ragas in a more formal, structural way, going into all the detail. I like to share my thoughts on intervals and melody with students, and let them experience and reflect on these things very precisely. In one way or another, these studies are reflected in my overtone singing pieces.

I consider the following piece, “You Am”, my best attempt at integrating melody of overtones and fundamentals in a balanced way.



Some artists approach overtone singing from a strongly scientific angle. In case you're interested in this, what do you feel 'research' could potentially uncover and provide in terms of tuning systems? Where do you see the biggest potential for exploration at the moment?

There are litteraly thousands of tuning systems, and many of them have to do with overtones in one way or another. One fascinating station on my own path is to let the “overtone series encounter itself" through my Zero sytem (0….).

I am intending to publish a new album with the results of 4-5 years of exploring overtone and tuning with Rollin Rachele, when we formed the Superstringtrio. Loads of short pieces and some longer ones, and so far I have released very little of that. It goes very deep into tuning questions that I think have never been explored by anyone.

Of all acoustic instruments except the Jew’s harp, the voice affords the biggest range of controllable overtones. But Jew’s harp can’t change pitch, while voices can theoretically sing any pitch. We exploited this possibility to a great extent, fine-tuning our voices in some very outlandish tunings based on inversed harmonic series, as you can hear in this short video.

The other big potential is the integration of melodic overtone singing in other choral and instrumental music. People to watch out for in this field are Stuart Hinds, Anna-Maria Hefele, Timber Freier and such groups as Spektrum led by Jan Stanek and Partial by Christian Zehnder.

What are the potentials of overtone singing for healing?
 
Many, as long as the overtones are not forced in the wrong way. It is best when they are embedded in other non-aggressive ways of singing and sounding, though sometimes a well-aimed aggressive sound can be useful or even necesary.

In my book I criticise some people who appropriate throat singing and chanting from older traditions to advertise their own vocal powers. Personally, I wear at least two hats, that of a musicologist, who should write and talk with distance about his subject, and that of a vocal performer who has been through numerous artistic, therapeutic, creative processes and challenges himself.

Having said that, for some of those who are more sensitive to overtones, perhaps about half of all listeners, the links between overtones and healing or therapeutic effects are immediately obvious. There is and always has been a huge interest in exploring it, starting with Stockhausen. Yet contrary to what many people think, the Tuvans and Mongols do not look at it that way, and the few Tibetans who practice chordal chanting have nothing to say about overtones. You should keep that in mind when you are interested in these questions.

There is certainly potential for healing or therapeutic work, but the only way that pays off in the long run is to go slow and spend time in finding answers for yourself, with your own voice. Follow your voice and the music will lead the way for you.



From the concept of Nada Brahma to "In the Beginning was the Word", many spiritual traditions have regarded sound as the basis of the world. Regardless of whether you're taking a scientific or spiritual angle, what is your own take on the idea of a harmony of the spheres and sound as the foundational element of existence?

Then I would like to repeat the quote of a friend and collaborator from my book p. 319:
"For Rollin Rachele, twenty years of singing overtones showed him that

‘we get to the very essence of awareness itself .... It is simply the essence of how sound is comprised. It is such an integral part of sounds of nature, of everything of the universe. And not even in the sound spectrum. It’s basically a manifestation of pure mathematics. And we are evolved around these aspects of nature. We are simply products of nature.’ “