Conversations With Ananda — Ch. 62, Mari Baughman, Singer & Conductor

Mari Baughman leads chanting at Ananda Portland with professional cellist David Eby.

Photo: Mari Baughman leads chanting at the Ananda Portland Center, with David Eby, a cellist whose story is included in this series.

Mari served for many years as Music Director for Ananda in Portland, Oregon. 

Q: Tell us about your background in music.

Mari: My Mom said that I started singing before I started talking, so it was obviously something that I came in with. In fact, while singing is when I’ve always felt closest to God.

As I was growing up, singing was my church. I went to church to sing, and I sang all the way through school, and after I left school I sang with community choirs. But I always felt that something was missing, and I stopped singing for a time until I found Ananda.

When Hanuman and I met, we were both coming out of relationships where our spiritual quest wasn’t understood, so we were very consciously looking for a spiritual relationship. A number of our first dates were to satsangs and kirtans at the former Ananda ashram in Atherton, on the San Francisco Peninsula.

At one of our dates, the Joy Singers from Ananda Village performed, and I was deeply touched and inspired. Afterward, I asked Nirmala, “What do I have to do to get to sing this music? I’ll do anything – just tell me what I have to do!”

She looked at me so sweetly and said, “Just hang around for a few years…” [Laughs] It was the best answer I could have been given, because I needed time to grow and mature in my attunement with Swamiji and the music. I think that when I did get a chance to sing, I appreciated it more than if it had been given to me right away.

Music had come easily to me, and I think having to wait several years was good for me spiritually. By the time I joined the music, I was stronger and more disciplined and focused in the spiritual path.

Some years later, the Joy Singers were touring on the road a great deal, and there was a need for a “home team” to sing at Sunday services. Auditions were held, and that was when I began singing, probably in 1984.

I was incredibly moved by the music – it became my closest connection to God, and it has been the place where I’ve felt His presence most powerfully.

I learned the music and sang with the small group for about five years, and then we moved to an Ananda Center where I was asked to direct the music ministry. I went forward step by step, because I had no formal music training. I had just picked up the tips you get from good choir directors, but I also had a lot of help from grace while I was learning to direct.

After I’d been directing for a few years, we were asked to return to the Village, and for several years I attached myself to Jeannie Tschantz who directed the music there. Jeannie brought me along to the lessons where she would help the singers, and in that way she taught me how to teach.

It was amazing to learn to put in words what I had formerly done by intuition alone. It was the most fulfilling piece of the puzzle, to learn how to share the music with others in a deeper way, and it’s been my joy to do so for the last twelve years.

I still direct a little, but I’m primarily teaching singers now, and for many of the new singers it’s an eye-opener to begin to understand why Ananda puts so much emphasis on music.

I’ve also enjoyed learning how to teach choir directors. By the time it becomes a person’s dharma to lead a group they’ve usually made a strong connection with the inspiration in the music. And then learning to bring out the inspiration through others gives them a deeper appreciation for the music and its role in people’s lives as a catalyst for inner transformation.

Q: Are there any particular approaches you use when you’re teaching directors?

Mari: The most important factors aren’t technical but vibrational. Ananda’s directors all know this, because it’s the essence of what we do – we all sooner or later discover that the details will take care of themselves if the inspiration is right.

Having said that, there are tricks for helping people learn to use their voice without having to understand music theory. The thing we emphasize most is tuning into the vibrations of the music and feeling what a piece of music is trying to say.

I encourage people to take the music into their meditations. I suggest that they take a song into seclusion and spend an entire week meditating with it and feeling it ever more deeply. It can be a wonderful spiritual practice.

Q: I remember a meditation where I sang “Brothers” mentally and it took me very deep.

Mari: I spent a week in seclusion singing and meditating on “Emerald Isle,” and it was wonderful.

I think I’ve had the most fun helping the singers get past the forms of the music and understand that the reason we’re singing this particular music is to attune our voices, minds, hearts, and souls. It usually takes a while before they begin to believe in it, but it’s fun to watch what happens when the light goes on.

As for helping the singers take the music deeper, I think it helps to know that the exercises we do in choir are essentially the same as our meditation practices. We’re learning to use our emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual bodies to connect with the Divine, and it’s inspiring people to begin to understand that it is inspiring.

Q: Ramesha said that new singers tend to make it more work than it has to be.

Mari: That’s why I stress that we’re not really here to sing. Singing is lovely, but the important thing is to learn how to set ourselves aside and just become open channels to let God flow through us.

People can get caught in the details. It’s especially hard to let go for those who’ve had lots of formal training, but it’s important to stress the need to let go and just feel the music so they can experience what it’s like to step out of the ego and let God flow through you instead of trying to push out energy to fill the room. I encourage the singers to practice taking their egos out of the picture, and just see what it feels like to relax in the moment and be God’s instrument.

I used to feel a little sad that I hadn’t had more musical training before I came to Ananda, but now I can appreciate that I was able to learn to use my intuition first and fill in the details later.

Q: Is it more about singing with the heart than the mind?

Mari: It’s about getting out of the way in all respects of ourselves. People can get stuck in their hearts, too, and when it happens they’ll be singing and living with lots of emotion, and it just stirs up the world around them. We focus on singing with devotion rather than emotion, and just calmly feeling the energy flow up the spine, similar to when we meditate. As it flows through each chakra, the energy and consciousness can take on the positive qualities of that chakra, and then we can offer it to God at the spiritual eye. That way, the heart’s calm feelings and the feeling of devotion can flow through us as an expression of God’s pure inspiration.

There’s a trick I use. I’ll ask singers to focus their energy so they’re strongly centered in their spine, and then think about the song and the vibration and message that is trying to come through the words and music. Then I’ll ask them to take an actual physical step to the side, and as their feet rest on the floor, feel that they’re stepping out of their ego-self, the little self, and stepping into the wider dimension that the music is trying to express.

The physical movement, combined with the conscious thought of leaving the little self behind, can help people understand how different it feels to sing with ego versus offering yourself to God to let Him sing through you.

Directors will say, “Fill the room with your voice!” Or “Send your energy out to fill the room.” And it just never made sense to me. It felt like it was reinforcing the ego’s control, to think of pushing out and filling the room. But I finally realized that it means exactly the opposite – instead of filling the room with your own energy, you just need to get yourself out of the way so the divine energy can expand outward through you. It’s a small difference in the words, but the feeling is very different.

Q: Are you able to describe how that feels?

Mari: I remember a day when I had a particularly powerful experience of feeling very open and present in the moment while I sang. I could feel a flow of energy moving through me and expanding outward into the room. It was a pivotal moment, the kind that gives you goose bumps. Again, it’s the difference between pushing and relaxing. If you’re pushing your own energy, you can be pretty sure you’re doing it with the ego, but if you can relax and visualize a flow of energy expanding through you, and let yourself be an instrument, that’s letting God sing through you.

People do get it over time, and it comes more easily as they get a sense that the ego isn’t what we’re working with, that the ego needs to be set in a corner for a time.

Q: Among the people I’ve interviewed, their approach to getting rid of the ego seems to vary a lot.

Mari: I’m looking forward to hearing what others have said. The more ways you can describe something, the more likely you can touch people quickly. If people can’t relate to how I’m saying it, maybe another director will say it in a way that they’ll get it immediately and there won’t be a lag time where they’re thinking “What does she mean?”

Learning to use the instruments of body, heart, will, mind and soul is a lifelong task. I’m constantly finding fresh depths in the music, and discovering how I can use my instrument and understand it in different ways. I think this is a really important point for new people to hear. It’s not a question of taking a class or singing in the choir for a few years and suddenly “getting it.” It’s unfolding layer after layer of understanding.

Q: When Ramesha and Chaitanya talk about the process of getting out of the way, they’re describing the same experience, but their approach is slightly different. Ramesha’s focus is on helping the singers learn to relax their throat, as a step toward being able to let the Divine sing through them. He says that when you’re relaxed and the throat is open, it’s almost like doing Kriya. Chaitanya talks about relaxing and letting the energy rise through subtle channels into the back of the head and beyond.

Mari: The ideal physical posture when we sing is very close to what we do when we meditate, especially when we practice Kriya. We use our spines and lungs the same way, and we form the inside of our mouths the same, and we focus our attention in the same place. Once you realize this, it becomes clear that singing isn’t just something we’re doing for entertainment. Singing is something we do to find God. For those of us who vibrate with singing, maybe it’s a little easier to understand it in those terms.

Feeling the energy rise in the spine as we sing helps us get our egos out of the way and place our voices properly. The more relaxed we are, the easier it is to sing. It’s the same as when we teach people to meditate: “Sit upright with a relaxed posture…” [Laughs]

If I can help people understand how to use their instruments better when they’re singing, I believe they’ll be able to meditate better, too.

Mari Baughman with husband Hanuman in 2010.
Mari Baughman with husband Hanuman in 2010.

Q: Do you ever suggest that Master will help them get out of the way if they pray to him?

Mari: I use a number of visualizations. One can feel Master standing with us, inside us, surrounding us, filling us, and let him sing through us. These are other ways of getting yourself out of the way. You can’t be there as your little self when you’re filled with Master.

We ask Master to help us get out of the way and use us as his instruments. It’s good to have that thought in the front of our consciousness before we sing.

Q: Do you suggest that the singers think of the audience? That they visualize one person, or the whole audience? Or should they put their attention somewhere else?

Mari: It depends. If we’re singing as a choir, I ask them to focus on the director, and let the director be the focal point for the energy. We talk about giving up control and letting the director guide us, like Krishna driving Arjuna’s chariot.

We feel the vibration of the song, and the energy of the music radiating from our spiritual eye. The director acts as a focal point for the vibration that expands into the room. I don’t suggest that people focus on individuals in the audience, because if a choir member’s eyes wander it can be distracting for the audience.

We take a different approach in small groups or solo singing where there’s no director. If the singers are truly able to get themselves out of the way and share without nervousness or fear, they can offer the vibration of the song to certain individuals in the room, soul to soul, as if they’re saying, “Namaste” – “My soul bows to your soul.”

If people are dealing with anxiety I’ll suggest they pick a point above the audience. In our church there’s a picture of Master on the back wall, and I’ll say, “Sing to Master. Give the song to him.”

Q: You have three directors in Portland. How does that work?

Mari: Our music program is growing, and we’ve evolved into a team of five. We each have our areas of expertise, and we all work well together, so it gives us a wealth of information that we can share.

One of us may lead a warmup, then the director will take over and run through the songs. We’ll talk about what we can do as a choir to improve our connection to the song.

Q: Are there other areas of the music that you’d like to address?

Mari: We use a technique that Swamiji gave us. He formulated it as five steps. It’s called “Say-Singing.” I’ve found it works wonders to help the singers tune into the music very quickly. Also, it helps them learn the technical side in a very simple way.

Many of our choir singers are relatively new to singing, but they’ve been able to feel how special the music is. A technical rehearsal would sail over their heads; they would be deeply bored and would probably leave. [Laughs]

It’s wonderful to have rehearsals that are focused purely on tuning into the vibration of the music. Aside from the lovely sound that comes out, we form deep soul friendships singing together.

The music seems to be touching people deeply now, in a way that it hasn’t before. Our choir has doubled in size in the last three months. We had an Oratorio concert recently, conducted by David Eby. The Seattle singers joined us, along with a few singers from other Ananda communities.

With our growing directing team we can share the music in more ways. One thing I’d like to see is a sing-along group for people who want to start singing but might not have the inclination or time to sing in parts. A children’s choir would also be great fun. The more ways we can help people discover the inspiration and soul growth of this wonderful music, the better the world will be.

 

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