Heartsong

For an explanation of the Heartsong, here is the theory as taught by Edgar Whenissy, Conductor of the Resonance of Being, at an open seminar to the artistic community of Port Hempstead.

"Every being, every living thing has a wavelength. All creatures respond to sound for this reason. Whether by ear or by vibration, noise affects all. Non-living objects aren't immune. Stone cracks and crystal shatters if the right frequency is used. Using this tuning fork demonstrates my point. You see? Sound, vibration, waves.

Every being also has emotions. And emotions have a sound. They vibrate, you are affected by them, you can resonate to them. This is not as easy to demonstrate, but I'm sure everyone here can remember picking up on a mood, feeling what someone else is feeling. I'm sure everyone can also remember a piece of art or a poem affecting them so as to change their mood. Think. Have you ever been unhappy and been to see the painting Sunshine on Layonara at the temple of Deliar? Did you not smile when you saw those beams of light, the play of color under the rays, almost tangible? What changed? It was only a picture. What changed was your emotions, the picture acting to modify the sound of your feelings.

The same is true for a song, most especially for a song, as songs are comprised of waves of sound. Emotional waves are what artists manipulate. The very act of being alive gives off waves, though we can't hear them. Well, most of them. So let's consider the person's very being as the 'resonance', as we call it, and their emotions the melody. This applies to all living things. Some things are so simple, so mindless that they have only a single resonance. And some things, such as elves or even dragons, have such complex and long lives that they have several resonances that mix with their melodies. We've found that most humans have no more than two, however, at least that's what we believe. This combination of resonance and emotional melody is what we call simply the Heartsong. Affecting this is the cornerstone of our art.

You can affect emotional melody fairly easy if you have any empathy at all. Most reasonably well-trained bards can do this. To learn the way of the Heartsong is to use those melodies to affect the resonance of a being, to amplify the wave, as it were.

I will ask Miss Ricca to help me demonstrate.

I strike the tuning fork, and it vibrates at a certain frequency. That’s the up and down movement of the tines. Hear that tone? Now, I'll still the vibration of the fork.
 
Miss Ricca will now sing that same pitch. Miss Rica, if you would? Mind your goblets, ladies and gentlemen, she has a powerful voice! Ah! And see, without so much as touching the fork, the tines are again set to vibrating, even more strongly than when I struck it! They move in response to Miss Rica's voice.

Let's take it one step further. You may have witnessed this before with crystal. Now this is a hefty glass goblet, very thick. I'll just drop it on the floor here to show that it's not likely to shatter as crystal would. Let's place it here and ask Miss Ricca to demonstrate once again. And there! Glass, not crystal, and it broke after only a few moments. The power of Heartsong. Thank you, Miss Ricca.

If emotionless metal or glass can be affected, why not a person? Emotions can change when certain combinations of sound waves are applied. And with training, so can the resonance of a living thing. We, in the Resonance of Being, teach this, although it is something that only a spellsinger can do as far as we know. Spellsinging is a misnomer, by the way. Instruments do everything the human voice does and more. Thus, spellstrumming would be just as accurate, or spellhonking. But that doesn't exactly roll of the tongue, does it?

Storytellers and poets can also be spellsingers. Of course, not everyone who is a spellsinger is a part of the Resonance of Being or even a follower of IlsareYou don't have to be. Training is also not necessary although it helps. Many good musicians are self-taught. But to answer a question I was asked earlier, raw emotion is the lifeblood of a follower of Lady Muse and we do believe her to be the source of the Heartsong.

Now, discussion?"

shadow