OCCULT VOICES - PARANORMAL MUSIC

This is the first time in the opinion of the compilers that a collection of sound, spoken and musical excerpts alleging either a paranormal theme or origin has ever been issued and made generally available to the public. The collection consists of three CDs devoted to different acoustic material which is nonetheless connected by the overall theme of the paranormal. Briefly, the first volume contains examples of trance speech, direct voice, precognition and prophesying; the second presents recordings of xenoglossy and glossolalia among them ethnological recordings; and the third encompasses paranormal music, rapping manifestations and electronic voice phenomena (hereafter EVP).

It should be made clear that the recordings were not chosen purely on the strength of the phenomena or its genuineness, but also as a phenomenology of the subject. The selections were determined by the availability and scarcity of the material. EVP represents the only chapter of the given recordings where numerous examples exist. The other audio documents are rarities, like recordings of mediumistic sittings before World War II, where only a few have survived. Some of the classifications of the examples were difficult to place consistently since trying to 'pigeon-hole' paranormal subjects often brings differences of opinion as to interpretation. For instance, when does a poltergeist case become a case of possession and vice-versa? These decisions have been made to try and produce fairly clear portrayals of the phenomena encountered. The listener may not always agree.

Describing phenomena of the nature herein might require the constant use of 'allegedly' because one is reliant on the sources employed. I shall use 'allegedly' sparingly to try to maintain a sense of impartiality, but it should not be presumed by the reader that its use is indicative of caution as to the validity of statements. Neither should the reverse be implied by its absence.

Paranormal acoustic phenomena

There is and always has been an obvious need within human existence to be able to see to survive and probably the sense of hearing, although of great importance, has to a large extent not been generally viewed with such consequence. However, it can be argued that one's hearing is the first of the senses to be felt and often the last to leave the dying body. Psychical research similarly tends to focus on the visual certainly in terms of the study of ghosts and apparitions and I believe this to be unfortunate since a vast amount of anomalous and possibly paranormal material can be witnessed via sound whether it be words or music or percussive anomalies. The importance of hearing is particularly necessary in conditions such as the darkened séance room where visibility is usually denied perhaps with the exception of a dim red light or similar illumination.

Direct Voices and Clairvoyance

People have been falling into trance and producing anomalous voices and clairvoyance since the earliest days of mankind and world history records many instances of this. Altered states of consciousness have been achieved by a variety of methods including drugs, alcohol, dancing, hypnosis and music. When entranced a variety of manifestations have occurred, but notably contact has been made with spirits or entities from other worlds or dimensions. These events have been interpreted as being genuine or fraudulent according to the belief systems of the observers and the strength and validity of the phenomena presented by the person in trance. In Western society a person that acts as a contact between spirit realms and the physical world is often referred to as a medium and although the word itself can encompass more than just this its use is prevalent enough to be used regularly.

In the nineteenth century a new religion called Spiritualism spread from the United States into Europe. It proposed that people lived on after death in a spirit realm and that through mediums contact could be made with them. This lead to literally thousands of men and especially women throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century believing that they possessed such psychic power. The details of their ectoplasmic exudations are beyond the remit of this work, but a sizeable number of the mediums believed that they could channel the spirits who would then speak through them. This became known as trance mediumship using direct voice. The lack of generally available recording apparatus in the nineteenth century has not allowed examples to be heard, but the Society for Psychical Research was eventually at the forefront of acquiring later recordings. The Society was founded in 1882 "to examine without prejudice or prepossession and in a scientific spirit those faculties of man, real or supposed, which appear to be inexplicable on any generally recognised hypothesis". Some members were responsible for putting onto record the voices of the mediums Mrs Leonard and Rudi Schneider. (These recordings are rare single pressings, 78 rpm.) Other groups, such as the Leslie Flint Foundation, produced tapes of their namesake chanelling large numbers of the deceased. There is a popular misconception that it is always the 'famous' that are chanelled by mediums, but this is not true. There are several examples on the first CD of ordinary people who chose to make contact with the mediums concerned and in the 'Enfield' case no mediums were present but just two young girls. There is often controversy concerning the voice itself - is it made via an ectoplasmic voice box or using the medium's own voice? However, what is actually said can cause even more disputes since hard facts are often not forthcoming from the spirits who seem to often concentrate on pleasant axioms or words of comfort to the bereaved which although not necessarily harmful do not help the psychical researcher find evidence. There are always exceptions to this and once again the 'Enfield' case provided examples of the two girls seemingly revealing facts about their spirit contact that were not known to them or other people that they knew. They did not attempt to make predictions about the future or prophesy and historically this gift has been firmly in the domain of soothsayers, astrologers, Tarot card readers and other diviners and psychics. There are numerous names one could cite such as biblical prophets (Moses, Elijah), historical characters (Nostradamus, Malachi of Armagh) and plenty of twentieth century examples (Edgar Cayce, Jeanne Dixon). Their predictions have often been very public affairs which therefore have a degree of theatricality to them which is quite evident in the rare examples provided here. A notable example is the recording of Hannussen.

Xenoglossy and Glossolalia

Classic occult cases:

The notions of xenoglossy (also known as xenolalia) and glossolalia are closely linked in terms of the manifestation, but are distinct in the possible source of the spoken emanations. Xenoglossy requires a person to speak in a language that is of this world but unknown to the speaker. Verification can be difficult since the details of a person's early childhood may be unknown and forgotten by the speaker thereby allowing words previously known to be repeated believing them to be new. Examples of this have been found in experimental hypnotic regression notably in the 'Bloxham Tapes' a BBC television documentary from 1976 showing the work of the Welsh hypnotherapist Arnall Bloxham. In more recent times the prominent researcher of reincarnation Dr Ian Stevenson has discovered examples of xenoglossy that he believes to be "persuasive". (Stevenson, 1974) Glossolalia is arguably impossible to prove since it requires the belief that the language spoken is not of this world but either a long forgotten tongue, for instance ancient Egyptian, the language of angels - 'Enochian' according to Aleister Crowley - or spiritual entities such as the "speaking in tongues" of the Pentecostal Church, or the language of aliens from different planets or galaxies. Famous examples of the latter was the alleged Martian, Uranian and Lunarian language spoken by Helene Smith investigated by Professor Theodore Flournoy at the turn of the twentieth century. He believed that her Martian was somewhat closely linked to French, but the Uranian was "very musical".

Ethnological material:

The extremely rare ethnological material on xenoglossy and glossolalia forms part of ethnomusicology which is a well-established area of research and institutes such as the School of Oriental and African Studies, London can provide considerable academic expertise on the subject. The use of songs with and without accompaniment to convey magic is accepted as an absolute truth in many cultures and the relation between music and trance is obvious in African and Arab cultures. In Music and Trance Gilbert Rouget draws together a close analysis of music and trance bringing them both into their cultural context. He concludes that "music's physiological and emotional effects are inseparable from patterns of collective representations and behaviour, and that music and trance are linked in as many ways as there are cultural structures". The examples of magic healing from 1905 and 1912 (CD 2, track 10 - 12) might be one of the first recordings of such an "occult" practice. Similarly remarkable is the example of an exorcism ritual (CD 2, track 13), the "dance of the kings", recorded in 1984 in Egypt.

Musical Mediums

The recording of mediums' voices has already been discussed, but what of their ability to produce music from dead composers and performers? Before suitable sound recording techniques were readily available there were examples of the importance of music with such mediums as Daniel Dunglas Home, Emma Hardinge Britten and Jesse Shepard. In Germany advice was given to the violinist Florizel von Reuter by the deceased Paganini and Stradivarius contacted the Reverend Charles Tweedale in England. The composer Robert Schumann contacted the violinist Jelly d' Aranyi also from the spirit realm. Many other examples could be given, but since there are no known sound recordings of these examples one is forced to research more modern examples from the twentieth century. Fortunately there are many people from this period who believe that they have been contacted by spirits to convey new music to them. The most important of these was Rosemary Brown from Wimbledon in England who wrote many hundreds of compositions from a wide range of dead 'classical' composers. Some of the music has been recorded and bears some comparison with the original creators. However, in many examples there is a certain lack of substance to the works as if they had been written when the composers were just starting to explore their musical style. The exception to this is the extract presented, Grbelei that has the hallmark of a late work of Liszt. Rosemary Brown's works have been scrutinised by many musicians and critics and they have arrived at different conclusions. Her supporters have included the concert pianist John Lill, the music professor Ian Parrott and the composer Leonard Bernstein. Her critics were also quite notable, namely the musicologists Eric Clarke and Denis Matthews. Other 'musical mediums' have not been in the public eye to such an extent but have nevertheless, in some cases, produced works of considerable interest and merit. Many of these ordinary people have not received musical training other than perhaps a few piano or singing lessons, but despite this have written music that is beyond their normal capability. Certainly in the recording of Leo a powerful voice was achieved that, although not similar in timbre or quality to the great tenor's, seemed to contain the essence of Caruso in a remarkable manner. (For further examples and considerably greater depth see Melvyn Willin, 1999.)

Rappings and Hauntings

Rappings have been written about for hundreds of years including well known examples at Tedworth 1662 ('The Drummer of Tedworth') and at Epworth 1716 in England. One of the most famous examples of rappings being heard in some ways led to the birth of Spiritualism in Hydesville, a small community in the State of New York in 1848 when the Fox sisters first communicated in such a way, whether it was produced fraudulently or otherwise. With the spread of Spiritualism the rappings increasingly became a way of communicating with spirits and this method has survived to the present day. The 'Philip' experiments in Toronto, Canada, in 1974 and the Batcheldor psychokinesis studies in the late seventies both produced rappings which were difficult to explain in normal terms. However investigators of such cases often recognised phenomena produced fraudulently combined with genuine ones, like Hans Bender at the poltergeist case of Pursruck in 1971. In 2000 in Euston, London communicative rappings were investigated by the SPR but found to be fraudulent at least on some occasions for example, the 'Drinkwater Case' (2000). Paranormal explosions are far less common especially when caught live on video camera and then investigated thoroughly by sound experts - the case in question being the 'Charlton House exploding cup' subsequently researched by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, London.

Electronic Voice Phenomena

In the early twentieth century Thomas Edison believed that communication with the dead could be achieved with electronic equipment, but despite attempts by psychical researchers to replicate his work it was not until 1959 that a breakthrough was made by the Swedish film director Friedrich Jurgenson. His work was then continued with considerable zeal by the psychologist Konstantin Raudive. Thereafter the voices became known in the UK as 'Raudive Voices' named after him. In the years since this early research literally tens of thousands of examples have been recorded usually in a variety of languages manifesting on otherwise blank tape. Often the conveyed examples are quite brief in duration and can be multilingual in content. Sentences appear with a strange rhythm and grammar, often staccato, with neologism, references to family names and precognitive statements.

The SPR has investigated it at various times (in the 1970s for instance) and the engineer George Meek announced in 1982 that he had built a machine that allowed direct communication with spirits (Spiricom). The pervading problem with EVP is the understanding of the words heard. Sceptics are always keen to point out that transmissions from very earthly sources can easily find their way onto electronic equipment and frequently the words heard are obscure at best and meaningless at worst. It might be thought of as an audio version of the Rorschach ink blot test whereby individuals interpret the words how they want to. Various examples of music, which are quite rare, have also been recorded some of which are played on CD number three.

Closely related to EVP is the phenomena known as 'telephone calls from the dead' the name used by the American psychical researcher Scott Rogo for a publication of the same name co-authored with Raymond Bayless in 1979. The idea that the dead could phone up living people and talk to them was possibly first explored in 1925 by Oscar d'Argonnel (a pseudonym for Carlos Ramos a professor in experimental physics). He made the connection, as others have since, that the presence of a medium was important for the contact to succeed, but the idea of such communication has broadened to encompass voices from extra-terrestrials. Perhaps there is a case to be made that some of the so-called "phone calls from the dead" are, in fact, phone calls from galactic entities! Telephones have been known to malfunction in other ways without voices being present as in the 'Rosenheim Case' where malfunctions seemed to be linked to the employee Anne-Marie S. at the office concerned. Quite often in these cases no conventional faults can be found with the telephone line or equipment and modern devices are also known to malfunction in unknown ways via fax machines and computers bringing this type of phenomena right up to modern times.

Conclusion

One can see, or perhaps more correctly, 'hear' that acoustic anomalies embrace a wide variety of different aspects of the paranormal. The communication with spirits and angels or speaking in tongues is important to diverse religions and the power of chanting or even just speaking can be overwhelming when the correct atmosphere exists. In practical terms the strength of music as a healing agent is seen both directly and indirectly in musical therapy and the effect of sound in terms of vibration has recently been suggested by the late Vic Tandy as a possible source of hauntings via 'infra-sound'. With mankind's continued interest in spiritual matters and with the advances of electrical equipment and information technology it is certain that acoustic phenomena of a paranormal nature will continue to manifest in society.

Melvyn Willin, Great Leighs, April 2007

References and bibliography

Hordern, Peregrine (ed.). Music as Medicine. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000.
Parrott, Ian. The Music of Rosemary Brown. London, 1978.
Ralls-Macleod, Karen and Harvey, Graham (eds.). Indigenous Religious Musics. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000.
Rogo, D. Scott. NAD. New York: University Books, 1970.
Rogo, D. Scott. NAD. Volume 2. New Jersey: University Books, 1972.
Rogo, D. Scott. and Bayless, Ray (eds.). Phone Calls from the Dead, 1979.
Rouget, Gilbert. Music and Trance. University of Chicago Press, 1985.
Stevenson, Ian: Xenoglossy: a review and report of a case, Bristol: Wright, 1974
Tame, David. The Secret Power of Music. Wellingborough: Turnstone Press, 1984.
Tandy, Vic. Apparitions & infrasound. JSPR, 860, 2000.
Willin, Melvyn. Paramusicology: An Investigation of Music and Paranormal Phenomena, University of Sheffield, England, 1999.
Willin, Melvyn. Music, Witchcraft and the Paranormal. Ely: Melrose Press, 2005.
Wood, Frederic H. The Egyptian Miracle. Watkins, 1939.