Suspended gong. Photo courtesy Saisie Moore
Frequency FIND YOUR
Sound Therapy combines ancient instruments and intuitive practices to offer a unique healing experience
S
ounds ignite powerful reactions within us, even in everyday life. From the swell of emotion from a favorite song to a jolt of tension provoked by a passing siren, we are closely attuned to the cacophony of the world. Today, while life seems noisier than ever, Maine’s sound therapy practitioners use an arsenal of instruments to drown out the din and provide calm and healing to their patients. Can sound therapy offer a balm to modern life? Research into the neuroscience of music therapy has identified several health benefits: boosting immune function, lowering anxiety levels, alleviating chronic pain, and even improving the health of premature babies. Sound therapy may be less clearly understood, but its patients find remedy in tone and vibration for both emotional and physical ailments. At the end of a long driveway in Union, Jim Doble of Elemental Design hosts sessions from a recessed octagonal space, framed on one side by windows and the other by suspended gongs and chimes. A craftsman with a flair for everything from glass to wood to metal, Doble found his way into creating percussive instruments and sound therapy quite by chance more than 20 years ago. 14 Spring 2022
by SAISIE MOORE
“I went to a musical improvisation workshop and played a huge wooden xylophone,” he said. “I really enjoyed it, so I came home and messed around and made one – just like that,” he added with a laugh. He tinkered around with instruments until one day, while playing a combination of glass and slate instruments with a friend, Doble felt something. “I was playing one, he was playing the other,” he said. “Suddenly, there was this other sound coming out. I felt it affect me, affect my brain. And I was like – what was that?”
“Escape from the overstimulation of everyday life might just be easier than you think.” ‘That’ might be the great humming resonance that washes over you during a sound therapy session. Doble invites his clients to lie in the center of the room and experience a soundscape that ebbs and flows, a sensation that provokes both physical and
emotional responses. The experience is far more primal and transporting than simply listening. “It's powerful,” says Doble. “There’s a substance to that sound; it really fills the room. It's very visceral. It can be overwhelming.” Doble’s primary instrument – a collection of 11 suspended gongs has diverse provenance, from the Myanmar Mountains to China, and some are even made in Doble’s workshop. “They all have their own sounds and personalities,” he says. In addition, he incorporates Tibetan singing bowls, wooden rattles, and tuning forks to produce vibrating tones on and around the body. The effect seems to both soothe and focus the mind. “I believe what matters is the progression of notes, the space between them, and their interaction with each other,” he says. “I sometimes refer to it as Sonic Meditation.” Individuals and groups can experience it themselves during a 90-minute session (from $80 per session). Currently, there’s no official certification process yet for sound therapists. Most find their expertise through workshops and collectives, even the odd “gong conference” (a real event, according to Doble), where pioneers of the practice began converging during the 20th century to establish the
