Listening under the Moon

Tanja Hylling Diers

 

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This text has developed from writings in my listening journal. I have been journaling about listening since September 2023. My journaling has become more organized and frequent in the spring 2024 when I started attending Deep Listening classes. (1)

 

This text is a documentation of the practice I call the Moon Choir. It takes place once a month at full moon. It started in September 2024 together with composer and singer Katinka Fogh Vindelev. Sometimes it is a practice I do alone and sometimes it is a collective practice.

 

My reason to start this practice has been a personal need to explore the space the full moon offers us as a space for creating connection between interior and exterior, body and voice through listening. The space has furthermore offered release of any pent-up frustrations or emotions in a playful way. The collective practice contributes a sense of community and connectivity, solidarity even. 

 

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Thursday May 23rd

 

Tonight, the moon is full. White moon. Flower moon. Rabbit moon. Miss Moon is calling for me. 

 

At 21:29 she will enter. 

 

She is hanging low tonight. 

 

More people are summoned by Miss Moon. We are gathered on a pier at Amager Beach. We never know how many will show up. The meeting is based on trust and how strong Miss Moon is pulling us towards her. 

We lean into this trust.

We lean into the magnetic power of Miss Moon.

We are a small group, just enough to constitute a group, but few enough that we all can feel an intimate connection to the others. 

 

We form a circle. 

 

Notice your breath. 

Inhale deeply. 

Exhale equally deeply. 

Repeat. 

Swing your arms back and forth. 

Swing your arms from side to side. Wrap and slap. (2)

Tap your body: Start with one arm and move across the torso, all the way down to the feet and back up to the other arm. 

 

Rub your hands together at a fast pace to generate heat. 

Form a ball. Feel the heat. Chi. Between your hands is an active energy field. 

Move your hands back and forth to expand and reduce the ball of energy between them. 

Send the ball towards Miss Moon. 

Repeat.

 

We form a circle again. Hold hands. A squeeze is passed around several times. 

 

We start a whispering game. 

 

Say a word and pass it to the ear next to you. Add your own word and pass it on. 

 

To seal the practice under the moon we strip and go swimming in the water. Our bodies and souls are illuminated by the moonlight. 

 

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Saturday June 22nd

 

Tonight, the moon is full again. Red moon. Strawberry moon. Midsummer moon.

 

A small group of people has been summoned. 

 

Miss Moon is supposed to arrive at 21:57. She makes us wait. 

 

We form a circle. We use our hands to gently slap our torso while we make sounds. Whatever comes out naturally. 

 

One person starts making a sound sequence. The others join in, following it and responding to it. It goes on for as long as it wants. Silence. Then the next person starts a sequence, and the others respond. Silence. 

 

We face the water. Place our feet in the cool sand. 

 

Walk as slowly as you can toward the water. (3) Feel how the surface beneath your feet is pushed away with each step. Destabilizing your steps. Walk slower.

 

(I struggle to move slowly. I have an eagerness in my body, something unsettled. Maybe it is the water that pulls me. Maybe it is the water that calls for me and that is the reason for my impatience to reach it).

 

When your feet are in the water, stop. Face Miss Moon. Listen to everything between you and the moon. Listen with every fiber in your body: from the soles of your feet to roots of your hair. Listen to the moon and back. Listen to what is close and what is far. 

 

We listen to the sounds that draw our attention. Penetrating sounds. We listen to the sounds that are more atmospheric, more in the background. The sounds that hold the soundscape afloat. 

 

**

Sunday July 21st

 

Solo Moon Choir

 

These scores can be performed at any full moon, alone or together with others.

 

‘Facing the Moon’

 

Face Miss Moon.

Use her face as your mirror.

 

Receive a greeting.

Send a greeting.

 

Repeat.

 

 

‘Moving like a Moon’

 

Stand facing the direction where the Miss Moon will show herself tonight. 

Make a circular movement with your hips like a moon circling a planet. 

Pause at some point along the orbit. Continue circling in the opposite direction. 

 

Come to a standstill. Feel the energy of your circulations.

Feel the energy from Miss Moon. 

 

Listen!

 

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Notes:

1) Deep Listening course by Morten Svenstrup in Copenhagen from April to May 2024 and Deep Listening Intensive I online by The Center for Deep Listening at Rensselaer from May to August 2024.

2) Pauline Oliveros: Deep Listening – A Composer’s Sound Practice, 2005, p. 6. And Heloise Gold: Deeply Listening Body, 2018, p. 32.

3) This slow walk exercise is inspired by a line of exercises called Extreme Slow Walk developed by Pauline Oliveros and Heloise Gold.