We’ll be absorbing and sifting brilliant ideas for two full days at the conference. Brains will be hard at work, synapses firing energetically. As a counterbalance to that kind of processing, we’ve intentionally spliced periods of spacious shamanic, meditative music throughout the conference.

We treat the conference as a kind of ceremony, including brief opening and closing rituals. We’ve also been asking participants to join us in treating the room as ceremonial space, a request that’s been honoured in fine style each year. Good work is happening in that room and the musical element isn’t just a break in the progress of the weekend, it’s an integral part of it, helping conference participants stay calm, present, and heart-centered as much as possible in this concentrated gestalt of empowering ideas.

The schedule is laid out so that there are rarely more than two consecutive content-laden presentations without either one of these music sessions or something like a tea break. For the music sessions we’re fortunate to have two master musicians who both have extensive experience in creating spacious, deepening, and heart-opening atmospheres.

This is Theda Phoenix’s third year with the conference. Participants have considered her music one of the highlights of the weekend. Theda creates gorgeous shamanic sound journey experiences using crystal and Tibetan singing bowls, chimes, rattles, ocean drum, rainstick, harp, guitar, and intuitive ethereal vocals and toning. See and hear more at her website: www.thedaphoenix.com.

There’s also a longer bio on the conference website under Artists: https://spiritplantmedicine.com/artist/.

Joining Theda this year will be Matthew Kocel. Matthew is known as a true visionary in the world music and sound healing movement, inspiring an international audience with his rare blend of Tibetan, Tuvan, North European overtone singing woven into expansive soundscapes that transcend cultural boundaries.

In support of the spiritual power of music, Matthew writes, “Using sound in a conscious manner we can bypass mental chatter, cultural conditioning, and blockages to experience the true oneness of existence. As more of us remember and embody this truth, we transmute the matrix of fear that has inhibited the course of human evolution for generations.”

You can find more information on Matthew, including audio examples of his amazing music, at his website: www.omshaman.com