Three and a half days of intense explorations of voice and movement for body-mind balance and creative, vibrant well-being.
Scroll down for the Mandarin version
中文見下方
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Voice Yoga Winter Solstice Retreat 2022. Photo: Jackal Mei
WHAT IS THIS VOICE YOGA?
WHAT IS THIS RETREAT ABOUT?
In Voice Yoga’s dynamic group process, you go beyond your habits and expectations. Something larger than yourself emerges: a flow of hidden creative potential.
Grounded in physical exercise such as yoga or contact improvisation, we work with all kinds of sounds without meaning and without emphasizing a beautiful singing voice. Pure, direct expressions and sensations of physical resonance and vibration through mouth, limbs, hips, feet, skin and inner organs.
We go beyond common subject-object and mind-body dualities, and bring our unconscious selves and sometimes irrational emotions to the surface. The group process becomes a mirror for the self and allows us to ‘see’ ourselves more clearly, to hear what’s living deep inside. The result is often of a surprising clarity and immediacy.
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PROGRAM OUTLINE
We start Thursday Dec 21st at 9 AM and suggest you arrive the evening before.
We finish after lunch on Sunday 24th, around 1:30 PM.
Day 1
9:00-12:30 introduction to the program. Light exercising, breathing exercises, start moving, toning, improvising. Deep sleep session is usually included!
12:30-14:30 lunch & siësta
14:30-16:30 Guided movement and sound practices, walking meditations, improvisations
16:30-17:00 Tea time
17:00-18:00 Guided movement and sound practices, walking meditations, improvisations
Day 2, 3, 4 (half day)
9:00-12:00 Slow meditative warm up, mild to vigorous exercising, toning, noise making. Once again: restorative (half-)sleep/dream.
12:30-14:30 lunch & siësta
14:30-16:30 Guided movement and sound practices, walking meditations, improvisations
16:30-17:00 Tea time
17:00-18:00 Guided movement and sound practices, walking meditations, improvisations
18:00-19:00 dinner
On Day 3, our last evening, after the Solstice and before Christmas Eve, we will jointly celebrate the change from darkness to light. Participants can contribute a memory or reflection, a song, a dance, individually, en groupe, as a duo, whatever comes up. Consider to bring an instrument you play, candles to lighten up the atmosphere, a special garment or hat to wear.
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PLACE
We hold our sessions in Shufang’s Energy Healing, a gorgeous yoga studio with a big garden in Dulan, Taidong. The studio has all utilities we need and is fully air-conditioned of course. We can use the big lawn outside for musical workouts in fresh air, giant rocks to repose, and shady places to rest.
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FOR WHOM?
The workshop attracts young, curious artists; established musicians and performers facing creative obstacles or blockades; yoga and other body-mind workers not very familiar with sound; people familiar with sound but needing a fuller understanding and experience of it; people youna and old looking for physical and spiritual development; practitioners of Buddhism and other contemplative traditions needing deeper breathing and chanting practice; busy people needing a break from work in a relaxed atmosphere. Despite the name, Voice Yoga is not a harsh or demanding yoga camp, quite the contrary: it lets you grow at your own peace and rest and sleep or observe when you want to.
There are no specific requirements to join. Ages frange from early 20s to around 75. Yoga, music or other skills are not required. We strive for a group between 8 and 12 people.
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HOW TO PREPARE?
Bring a yoga mat to exercise and lie down. There are sitting cushions and also chairs if you cannot sit on the floor for long. Bring something to cover yourself when we repose or meditate. Bringing an instrument is a good idea (no need to play it well; a percussive instrument is always good).
Voice Yoga Winter Solstice Retreat 2022. Photo: Jackal Mei
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LANGUAGES
English + Chinese
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YOUR TEACHER
Mark van Tongeren is a Dutch sound explorer with a deep interest in the synergy of arts, sciences and contemplative traditions. Mark has 30 years of experience in theatre, music and dance productions and holds a PhD from Leiden University’s Academy of Creative of Performing Arts. He practices yoga for some twenty-five years and all kinds of voice/music/performance practices for 35 years. His enterprise Fusica was established in 1998 to explore intersections of sound and the arts (music) on the one hand, and science and academica (fusikè, physics) on the other, with .
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MEET THE TEAM & CONTACT
This workshop is brought to you by organiser Jackal Mei, translator Sunny Chen and hosted by Shufang Wang.
Administrative assistance by Hsi-Yin Chang.
Jackal, Sunny, Mark
For any questions about the contents in English, ask Mark.
mark@fusica.nl
FB: https://www.facebook.com/Paraphony
Phone 0910382749
For any questions about the contents in Mandarin, and for lodging, travel and food details, ask Jackal.
– online application form: https://forms.gle/WoCuHwKaMbzp7LZm6
– After transferring, please SMS, Line, or email to inform Hsi-Yin with your name, and the last 5 numbers of your bank account
– After receiving your fee, we will send a confirmation email in 5 days, and invite you joining our line group for more event detail.
PAYMENT
Bank code: 822.
Name of bank: China Trust
Beneficiary: Mark Christiaan van Tongeren
Account number: 163540306745
Make sure to send an email to Hsi-Yin after your payment. We will confirm reception as soon as possible.
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DISCLAIMER
We try to keep prices reasonable. If you cannot make it for some reason, we will return 80% of deposit fees up to 2 weeks before the event, 50% in the second week before starting date, and no refund in the last week leading to the event. In case of proven COVID-19-related problems we can give a refund (minus admin charge) or save the registration and fees for a next workshop.
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DISCLAIMER
By signing up you automatically acknowledge your understanding that this retreat sometimes involves strenuous physical exercise, potentially disrupting body-work and emotionally charged sessions with a deep impact on your well-being. It is understood that you yourself best know of any risks (physical, emotional, psychological) and that there is no pressure or obligation to do each and every exercise. By joining this retreat you accept the consequences and state your intention to complete it till the end. You waive all rights to seek or receive compensation in case of injury, loss or damage.
We reserve the right to cancel the retreat in the case we do not reach the minimum number of participants, between 4 and 2 weeks before starting date; in this case all paid workshop fees will be promptly returned. We are not responsible for expenses for the BnB or transport.
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KNOW MORE?
Mark’s Voice Yoga runs for over 10 years and brings together decades of creative, vocal expression, yogic discipline and contemplative traditions.
Voice Yoga is neither yoga as you see all around you, or music as you hear it every day. It is a personal, artistic synthesis of a wide range of musical, resonant, theatrical, contemplative and physical arts. What binds them together is Mark’s unique synthesis and his vision to create a strong sense of flow, no matter what the activity is. Serious workouts smoothly blend with unforgettable (and unrepeatable!) musical creations, deep breath work morphs into contact improv and vocal exercises into absurdistic theatre.
This retreat will give you a big boost, whether you are a musician, dancer, yoga teacher, actor, or just interested in working on your personal growth through the connections between sound, body and mind. No problem if you’ve never done yoga before!
“I felt many sounds inside me first time and I felt there is an inner space inside my body. That was an very powerful experience for me. The body wasn’t what I knew before. I felt peace when you sang… I do have a lot of fun when you want us imitate your voice… Every time when we make sounds together I feel I am decomposing and putting every part of me in one again. “
– Judith
” Your class shows me the magic of breath and voice. This makes my inner child very happy. “
– Nancy
” I enjoyed the class very much today. You had everyone engaged and creatively expressed as well as discharging and recharging well. “
– Tina
” More than ever, it brings back my childhood so I can play again. “
– Kovida
” Your class shows me the magic of breath and voice. This makes my inner child very happy. “
– Nancy
” Voice Yoga helps me feel lighter. “
– Jennifer
” I enjoy a lot and feel relaxed, this is a special course for me. “
At the end of 2019, in fact around the Winter Solstice on December 21, we did the first Voice Yoga Retreat here in Taiwan. A wonderful recollection of the best stuff I have done during my 7 seven years of weekly Voice Yoga classes. It was beyond expectation: fantastic weather, great location, wonderful students, and a great three-person-strong core team (Sunny Chen, Jackal Mei, me) to take care of everything.
Most of all, we all experienced a nice flow between yogic and other exercises, sound and body improvisations, eating cakes and drinking Jackal’s homebrewn coffee, meditating, listening, chanting, learning about my methods and ‘vision.’ People came from all over the place and all walks of life, and most were new to Voice Yoga.
One student, Guang Guang, wrote an excellent report in Chinese about everything we did, in Chinese. I reproduce it here, with an autotranslation at the bottom of this page. Jackal Mei made some great photos, and there’s a couple of myself too. Many thanks to Guang Guang and Jackal for the words and images, and to Sunny !
We’ll do another Voice Yoga Retreat later this year on the beautiful, relaxed East Coast of Taiwan, where the pace is slow, weather seems to be nearly always good, birds sing loudly and the ocean is never far away. Get on the maillinglist for updates.
Because there are always many good friends around me, then put into a path. at the beginning, the leaves share the voice with me, and let me plant seeds in my heart…
So recently, I went to experience a sound yoga,
The teacher who taught is the mark of the pan-Yin.
I love his selfless and loving sharing
And take care and feel every one of us
When the first class said
The voices made here are all about the moment.
There is no bad right or wrong, every voice is right…
Let me feel free to feel at ease
First night
Mark is very natural to mix everyone’s voices together in space, let each other’s strange partner, quickly flowing, just two hours, my whole body is dancing.
/ breathing practice
A lot of things to feel in this practice,
I am also practicing to practice the feeling
Where to breathe, where to go, expand or shrink…
Never thought about what happened so naturally,
But these two recent courses are reminding this thing, that is the moment.
/ vowel triangle
Love to play with the vowel triangle
But I will find myself very short in this,
Will also want to work with other people
Make your own rhythm between perfection and coordination
Oh ~ suck ~
Oh ~ Ah ~ one
/ the ocean of sound
With the imitation of a natural voice,
Let your voice be thrown into the ocean
The Forest, the pond, the water, the swamp, the swamp, the sky, everything, the sound of the earth.
Who likes to share quietly, she feels like she’s shiny, so let the voice come out on her own…
So conscious body, I’m still on my way to practice
/ deep listening
Voice together in the outdoors,
Listen to the sound of the space and follow
Listen to the sound of not, create
In the way.
Made a contemporary music
I love this fusion melody.
/ surprise
Surround a circle and make a few voices with Mark,
Close your eyes and close your eyes
A few sounds without rules
Then slowly,
Mark puts the nissan into the circle
Close your eyes in the circle and enjoy the melody
Mark is singing faster and faster
Getting more and more specific
Starting to find something wrong
Open your eyes and look at mark
He smiled at me
She has already learned it early.
Yes, it’s really what I thought
The students laugh at one after one.
Mulberry finally realized the chú le of this party
I am in tears to accept everyone’s singing
This moment is so touching
So beautiful ~ so beautiful ~
/ Winter Solstice Lights out
Surround the candles with a peaceful night, close your eyes with the feeling of stars, the sound of nature that surround us, like the stars that have fallen in the grass, the sound of everything.
/ sana ceremony
Classmate Blues on the night for you all the night
First experience ceremony, the sana drum burst out my whole body current, under the protection of the guardian spirit, I felt the process, the jungle, the speed, the dark spin, then the snake that came out, finally let myself slowly pull away, see one Deer stop
Lithuania was called by the drum of the drum to run
It also dance, the whole field, sitting or moving.
Every world, fantasy world ~
/ vowel
I am deeply aware of my voice.
Where did the sound go in the resonance body?
Mark said
Where the body and the sound will be resonance
But but
Ideas can also let the voice go where you want him to go
At the end everyone’s voice shakes,
All have different discoveries
This makes me think the voice is so funny
Everyone’s body feels so unique
/ breathing rhythm
The difference in the length of breathing,
Can also be a beautiful song
I’m enjoying this chapter too
The sum of each instrument
It’s a movement of life.
/ Pan-voice solo
One afternoon mark singing for everyone
Sitting and lying free
It was a cloudy afternoon.
While a pan-Tone Melody keeps on the these
All I hear is the voice of an angel
Right now
The Golden sunshine outside the window goes through the pink curtains
Angel Light gentle on mark
I didn’t have time to take pictures of that one
But in my mind
My whole body is dancing
/ eight sound
Everyone’s voice is so unique and nice
There is the singing of the old soul in the voice of the old soul
Thinking of her guardian spirit grandma and love
It’s my turn to kick the card.
Is the flower God singing!!!
Clear and beautiful, so touching
When it was my turn, my head wanted to work
Later I told myself to forget it
What makes the voice is what is
Even though I know my voice is not even where I’m going
My Voice God is helping me find the level
Went for a couple of semitone
I just went to the place where I should go.
I can say too
That’s my precision in control of my semitone (allocated ~
After three days of playing
Very Loose, slow and amazing body all kinds of sour
I didn’t expect it. It was just a voice.
The body has all kinds of pull
But remember that Xin Xin said very well
(but I forgot what she said XD)
But after she said, I just had a moment.
Lala also shared mark in mechanical noise
Find out the rhythm of its regular rhythm
Make noise not just noise
Harvest a lot in three days,
Maybe I’m still in the aftershocks and feel slowly
The only part that knows what I know most
Probably I’m not that relaxing myself yet
The voice is too strange to me after all
But after these process
It’s better to lose the established impression of the voice in my childhood
The Color of the voice is so wide and infinite
Tell yourself, it’s just to play, go play!
Sound Yoga is yoga and impromptu
He is more than a voice,
Is the one that makes the heart, spirit and body
Thank you Yu Chih Lin for taking me on the pool
Thank you Xiaoying Ye for the link
Thank you Jackal Mei for the invitation XD
Thanks Mark Van Tongeren
Leading the experience of my experience
Had me so much fun on this sound tour…
I began a new class: Shruti Nights, and ran No. I-VIII throughout the year, each with a different theme.
Listen to a nice duet I did with Sunny, translator, co-producer of many of my events, and talented singing student.
RADIOGARDEN BROADCAST
MUSHIMARU’s PHYSICAL POETS
I joined a Butoh workshop and performance by the huge family of Butoh dancer Mushimaru Fujieda and his regular students and collaborators, twenty in total. They came flying in to Taiwan from Japan, Hong Kong and other places, paying from their own pockets. Very dedicated and truly inspiring!
With Hiroyuki Matsuhisa (moham-veena), Shree Katsura (voice and suwarmandar), Mikio Kawasaki (photographer); Sogyu Fukumura, a very famous monk who quit Buddhism decades ago and became activist; Himeko Narumi, whom I visited in her bar in Kyoto a few weeks later; Vinci Mok from Hong Kong, not to mention lots of interesting old and new friends from Taiwan. Our performance UNDER THE TREE OF LIFE is on Youtube, beginning here with the entry of Mushimaru himself.
Recently many Taiwanese repaid the visit to Japan to collaborate with the same people, and one commented that the same performance turned into a rather hard-edged, noisy, radical performance, completely different from the soft version here in Taiwan. More true to the Butoh spirit, for sure, but I was still impressed with Mushimaru and all the kids who joined the event in Taiwan as very narural, innocent performers.
SANGPUY live IN TAIPEI
LUGANG and its AUTOMATED SONIC SURPRISES
Trip to Lugang, where we were deeply impressed by the Longshan Temple. It is not as famous as some other old temples in Lugang, which are more centra. But by far our favorite. Major reasons: little modernization, no entertainment, quite silent (no tourgroups with amplified guides). However, in both temples I encountered automated percussion devices. There was a procession leading to the very noisy and central Mazu Temple or Tian Hou Temple. I had to get away at some point because of the incredibly loud firecrackers, which I found unbearable, and our dog really got shocked from it.
There was no smoke anywhere, and it turned out the noise was produced by a firecracker machine, which you see at the end of this video.
A little later, in Lungshan Temple, I noticed a drum was playing all the time but I saw no one beating it. It turned out to be another automatic device producing percussive sounds, just like the firecracking machine.
PULI, CENTRAL TAIWAN: WORKSHOP
In April I was off to Puli, central Taiwan, for a workshop and another one with Canjune, exploring herbs and plants in the forests. From the roof of a cinnamon producer, a panorama of Puli’s iconic Chung Tai Chan (= Zen) Temple.
After the workshop, re-connect with a nun I got to know in 2004, with a fantastic voice: Guanzu Shi. For all these years she is studying the performance of a specific song in the Huayen Buddhist tradition, for which the way to pronounce many syllables is not exactly known.
SAINKHO and KAZHUHISA ICHIHASHI in JAPAN
First trip to Japan. Too many impression so share, but here’s a few. Basically a family tour but, lucky me, I ran into Sainkho one or two days before she launched her new CD with Kazuhisa Uchihashi in Beijing. Great show together!
What a lovely guy, and what a great show he pulled off. The most astounding thing was that after the ‘normal’ stage show, which already featured lots of people from his village Jrben, some girls began singing and dancing in the lobby. The men joined and sure enough hundreds of people began to join the line after a while. The whole thing lasted at least another 45 minutes, with the last part (not in this video) some very high-energy indigenous male dancers/singers promoting their upcoming hot dance show.
TAIWAN EASTCOAST TOUR
To Mud Studio in Yilan, Zhishan for workshop in Poco a Poco, my first houseconcert in Taiwan, near Hualien, and another concert in Hualien. See my special blogpost.
Bernard produced a dozen or so throat singing CDS and many other interesting titles from around the world. All from this modest office.
EXCHANGE OF NEW TIBTEAN MUSIC PUBLICATIONS
I bring Pan Records’ new CD Phursang Kelak Lama to Ricardo Canzio on behalf of Bernard Kleikamp. Ricardo gave me his precious new book Sakya Pandita’s Treatise on Music.
Het is al weer jaren geleden dat Mark van Tongeren in Nederland een workshop heeft gegeven. In juli is er weer een kans om 1 of 2 dagen aan je stem te werken en zelf te ervaren hoe je boventonen in je stem hoorbaar kunt maken.
In deze workshop maak je kennis met de methode die Mark ontwikkeld heeft om op een natuurlijk manier de mogelijkheden van je stem te verkennen.
Je begint met de adem, meditatie en opwarmoefeningen, waardoor je ‘in je lichaam’ komt. Vandaaruit laat je de klank van je stem in allerlei vormen tevoorschijn komen. We richten ons vervolgens vooral op resonantie/boventonen en op improviseren, en leren hoe die twee beide al gegeven zijn in hoe we dagelijks geluid maken.
De workshop wordt deels gehouden in de geweldige akoestiek van de Dokzaal, een lust voor oog en oor.
Ben je beginner, kom dan dag 1 en ga door met dag 2 als je dat wilt. Als je al ruime ervaring hebt met de stem en boventonen kan je eventueel alleen de tweede dag komen.
We houden twee korte en twee langere pauzes. In de Dokzaal, waar we overdag ook al eens gaan zingen, sluiten we na het avondeten af met een slotsessie. Geheel opgeladen weer naar huis!
Kosten: 1 dag €75, 2 dagen €130. Je krijgt € 5 euro per-dag korting (€70 1 dag, €120 twee dagen) als je je deze week aanmeldt (uiterlijk vrijdag).
Schrijf naar info@fusica.nl om je aan te melden of voor vragen.
Je kan het bedrag overmaken naar NL89INGB0006301187, t.n.v. M.C. van Tongeren, in Bennebroek.
In principe is de workshop in het Nederlands, mochten er veel niet-nederlandstalige aanmeldingen zijn en wordt het engels, dan hoor je dat.
Workshop Voice Yoga & Overtones
Saturday July 8 juli (beginners), Sunday 9 juli (advanced)
10:00 – 20:00 (met 2 pauzes)
Dokzaal, Plantage Doklaan 10-12, Amsterdam (nabij Artis)
In this workshop you get to know Mark van Tongeren’s method to explore the possibilities of your voice in a natural way. You start with breathing, meditation and warming-up exercises, bringing you ‘into your body’.From there you allow the sounds of your voice to appear in many different forms. We continue to focus on resonance/overtones and om improvising and learn how these two are already there in the way in which we make sound in our daily life. The workshop is partly conducted in the amazing acoustics of the Dokzaal. Are you a beginner, join for day 1 and go on to day 2 if you like. If you have ample experience with the voice and overtone singing you could come only on day 2, though following the 2 days is better.
Price: one day €75, 2 days €130. There is a 5 euro per-day euro discount (€65 one day, €120 two days) for early-bird registrars (no later than Friday June 23).
In principle the workshop is in Dutch, but let me know if Dutch is a problem, I’ll let you know if it can be in English. Write an email to info@fusica.nl to register or ask questions.
You can make your payment to NL89INGB0006301187, M.C. van Tongeren, in Bennebroek.
