Underlying Sound in Eastsound

— by Lin McNulty, Managing Editor —

“”We create through our voice, through the power of our voice,” Tom Kenyon says.

Orcas Islander Tom Kenyon thought he would probably pursue becoming a Trappist Monk, and devote himself to a cloistered, contemplative life of relative silence. With a voice range of four octaves, however, silence was not to be his path.

As he was putting himself through college he started writing music and playing in lounges. A series of unexpected spiritual experiences then launched him into fervently studying the effects of music on the human brain. As his study began, he was using EEGs, which only show squiggly lines indicating brain activity. He then expanded the field and became the first to use neuro brain mapping to depict actual topographical images of the effects of music and sound on the brain.

In the early 1980s, he founded Acoustic Brain Research. A student at Indiana University had become familiar with his work and when his Professor of Neuropsychology said in class that it was possible to increase alpha activity, but not theta, the student presented him with a recording from Kenyon that was shown to increase theta brain activity. The professor, believing there was something wrong with the equipment, asked that the equipment be taken apart. The result was the same.

Kenyon continued his study to include obtaining a Masters Degree in Psychological Counseling, while also pursuing studies in Tibetan Buddhism, Egyptian High Alchemy, Taoism and Hinduism and the sciences relative to each. He is a self-proclaimed “neo-pagan / Taoist / Tibetan Buddhist / agnostic / quantum physicist / mystic.” He is also an author of five books. One of his books, “Altered Brain States,” still in print and its fourth edition, remains required reading in many colleges.

“I am not a fan of dogma,” Kenyon states. “I am more attracted to the science of how this all works.”

No longer involved in actual research, he has been traveling the world (six times around the globe) putting his vast, unique abilities into practice. He offers chanting or toning workshops in sound healing as often as six times a year to his international following, often having to turn down invitations. This weekend 280 people from 13 countries are coming to Rosario for one of his workshops. Once or twice a year he holds these sessions on Orcas, contributing considerably to the local economy.

Two instances stand out in his memory during his travels. The VA invited him to teach at a VA hospital in Anchorage to help veterans with PTSD. A female veteran whose veteran brother had recently died of stomach cancer, had just come off kidney dialysis and she was suffering residual pain. Taking the veterans through the process, Kenyon taught the attendees to vocalize sounds from their bodies. When this woman started vocalizing sounds from her kidneys, a frightening childhood experience came up for her. At the conclusion, however, her kidney pain was gone. She then related the story of her brother to Kenyon, asking if his stomach cancer could be related to his father always punching him in the stomach and calling him a “piece of sh*t.”

Kenyon also had the opportunity to meet a four-foot tall female Inuit Shaman in her mid-30s. She had been beaten by nuns in school if she practiced her Shaman skills, once to the point of near death. She then entered a spirit world where she heard a spirit sing her back into this world. “You are that spirit,” she told Kenyon. She had not heard that sound since her near death experience.

While in France, he was approached by a film producer and his wife to do a film. Kenyon’s first reaction was “hell no.” He eventually became convinced, however, because of the ability of a film to reach more people and to leave a legacy for his work. The soft-spoken, reclusive Kenyon describes the three-and-a-half year process as agonizing.

“I consider the movie to be a story of everyone’s dilemma, and this is just the story of how I came to be.” The film now has a life of its own and will be presented at the Orcas Island Film Festival on Friday, October 10 at 9 p.m. at Orcas Center. Kenyon will be present for a Q&A.

For more information please visit: www.songofthenewearth.com. View movie trailer here:

The movie is going international. This is now “a time in life when I need to step off public arena and find what I need to do next,” he sighs. This next year he is taking a sabbatical—to learn how to watch acorns drop.