Learning to guide singing bowl practice

Learning to guide singing bowl practice · Article 01

Singing bowls: when should you strike again?

Giang MettaListening and teaching practice

An example for practice

Two hands pause after a single strike.

Thinking…seven, eight, nine…

Learner AHand still waiting

ThinkingI can still hear it. Quieter now, but not gone.

Learner BHand still waiting

Both are waiting.
They may be waiting for different reasons.

In this example, A is counting while B is following the sound. If I only watch their hands, I could easily think they are doing the same thing. But when I am teaching, I need to know more: how do they decide when to strike again?

I would not tell A to stop counting yet. A may be counting and listening at the same time. I want to know what they can still hear when they decide to strike. To make that question useful, we first need to agree on what this exercise asks them to listen for.

How much of the sound should you wait for?

For this exercise, I ask you to follow one sound until it is very faint, then strike again. The pause gives you time to hear the end of that sound. It is not about keeping your hand still for a set number of seconds.

If you strike while the earlier sound is still clear, the two sounds overlap. That is not wrong in every way of playing a bowl. It just makes it harder to hear the first sound on its own, which is what we are practising here.

As you listen, these simple descriptions can help:

  1. Just struckThe sound is clear.
  2. Getting quieterIt may become softer, then seem clearer again.
  3. Very faintYou need to pay attention to hear it.In this exercise: strike again around here
  4. No longer clearIt is hard to separate the bowl from other sounds in the room.
These are descriptions, not measurements. There is no fixed number of seconds for every strike: the bowl, the force of the strike and where you sit all matter.

At “very faint”, you can still hear the bowl if you pay attention. That is the point I choose for the next strike in this exercise. You do not need to wait for the whole room to become silent or search for the quietest possible sound.

The sound does not always fade evenly. It may become softer and then seem clearer again. So rather than striking as soon as it gets a little quieter, keep listening to how it changes.

A single strike can also make a bowl vibrate in several ways at once, producing different parts of the sound. Terwagne and Bush measured these on four bowls.1 Their study does not give a number of seconds to wait between strikes. As a beginner, you do not need to name every part of the sound either. Start with what you can actually hear.

How do you help someone else hear it?

Back to A and B. They now know this exercise asks them to follow the sound until it is nearly gone. If A says, “I finished counting,” I still do not know whether the sound was clear or very faint. Instead of saying “slow down”, I would ask:

When you struck again, could you still hear the earlier sound clearly?

If A could still hear it clearly, we can listen to that part again and try waiting a little longer. If A says it was already very faint, I would listen with them. I would not ask them to wait longer just to reach a different number.

The same applies to B. Saying “I am listening” does not tell me what they hear. I can ask B to show when they would strike again, then briefly explain why. Their answer helps me decide which part to listen to together. It is not a reason to rank A below B.

Someone may hear a change but struggle to describe it. “Is it still as loud as when you first struck?” is easier to answer than “Listen more carefully.” If all you notice is that it gets quieter, say that. If you cannot hear a change yet, say that too. You do not need to pretend you hear what your teacher hears.

I am not just replacing an instruction with a question to sound kinder. I am asking so I know what to do next: listen to a part again, wait longer or explain the exercise differently. Try choosing a question in the example below.

Try it: A strikes while the sound is still clear

In the same single-sound exercise, A strikes again while the earlier sound is still clear. Asked why, A says, “I counted all the seconds.”

What would you say next? Choose a response to see what it offers and what it leaves unanswered. This is a teaching example, not a quote from a real learner.

What would you say to A?

Choose a response to see a suggestion.

Whatever you choose to say, you still need to hear A's answer before giving more advice. If A had not noticed the earlier sound, listening together may help more than simply giving them a new number to count to.

Take the question into a practice round

You only need one bowl you already know how to use. If you have a partner, one person plays while the other listens and asks. There is no need to add more bowls yet.

  1. Strike once and listen. Notice how the sound changes from clear to very faint.
  2. Choose when to strike again. Remember what you could hear at that moment.
  3. Talk after the round. Why did you choose that point? If the answer is unclear, listen together again, then swap roles.

You do not need to talk throughout the sound. Listen first and discuss it afterwards. Two people may choose different moments. The useful question is what each person heard, not whether you can make your choices match.

If you lose track of the sound, let it finish and try again. If listening feels uncomfortable, stop rather than trying to finish the exercise. On your own, you can briefly explain your choice after each round. If you are learning to guide others, you also need practice listening to their answers and deciding how to respond.

Before the next strike

At the beginning, all we could see was A and B waiting. Now the question is not who can hold their hand still for longer. I want to know what they heard, why they chose that moment and how I can help them listen more closely.

Completing this exercise does not mean you are ready to lead a whole session. But it gives you one specific thing to practise: before correcting someone's playing, hear what they have to say about the sound.

Listen first.

Common questions

Must the room be completely silent before I strike again?

No. In this exercise, wait until the bowl is very faint. You do not need complete silence or the quietest sound you could possibly detect.

What if I only notice the sound getting quieter?

Start there. You do not need to hear several parts of the sound yet. Explain what you noticed and why you waited, then listen again with your teacher.

Is counting seconds wrong?

No. Counting can help you record a practice round. But in this single-sound exercise, you still need to follow the sound rather than wait only for a number.

Sources and further reading

This article draws on a discussion about striking and listening in a singing bowl lesson. A and B, the suggested questions and the exercises were added for teaching practice. They are not events from the class. This is a single-sound listening exercise, not a complete course in leading singing bowl sessions.

If you want to study beyond this exercise:

  1. Denis Terwagne and John W. M. Bush (2011), Tibetan singing bowls, Nonlinearity 24, R51–R66. DOI: 10.1088/0951-7715/24/8/R01. The study measured vibration patterns in four bowls. It does not establish when to strike again or test the exercise in this article. ↩

Giang Hoang

Giang Hoang

IPHM Certified Sound Healing Practitioner (UK)
Yoga teacher, E-RYT 500 & YACEP (Yoga Alliance)
Giang Metta Academy: IPHM Accredited Training Provider (No. IPHMNC22210) · RYS 200 & RYS 500 (YA ID 442630)
Based in Da Lat, Vietnam. Teaching online worldwide.

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