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TranceFormations

The Rhythm makes you Dance

Hello and welcome to my website

My name is Rishi Sigurd Vlote. I am a drummer, musician, facilitator for TranceDance, Shamanic Rituals and Facilitated Drum Circles.

I play drums since my childhood and it is my favorite musical and creative expression. Creating rhythms, grooves, songs and spaces for people to dance to is where I feel at home. Very soon in my career I realized: If there is anything that gets people to move and dance, it’s the rhythm of the drums.

Since the earliest records of human „culture“, drums were the instruments which were used amongst all continents: Africa, India, South America, North America, Europe, I can’t conceive of a culture without drums and rhythm.

My drumming story

I started drumming at the age of 4 on my grandmas pots and pans – and I still recall how a colleague of my mother made me a drum from a tin can, when I was about 6 or 7.

When I was 11, my mom had the idea to sign me up for the local marching band. When I got there, I was given a (very heavy) brass snare drum with a goat skin and a pair of heavy sticks and was shown how to hold and play the sticks. That was a good training – and although it was certainly not the kind of music that I wanted to play I am forever grateful to my mom for this . My favorite bands where Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, The Sweet and UFO. Quite the opposite of marching music.

At the age of 12 with my first „real“ drum

So after about a year I dropped the marching band and bought my first snare drum and a cymbal,, fixed some cardboard boxes (from Grandmas washing powder) on a stand and banged ahead to my favorite long players (LP’s – specially Deep Purples „Made in Japan“).

I quickly had a reputation for my drumming, and my mother realized, that this was a real passion of mine, because I spend almost every free minute of my time on my „drum set“. And after another year she bought a „real drum set“ for Christmas, which was the most amazing thing I could have imagined! And only three weeks after I had a proper drum kit, I was already part of my first band.

We named ourselves „Hochspannung“ (High Voltage) and played Prog- and Latin Rock, inspired by Deep Purple, Nectar, Santana and other bands from the 70’s 80’s. It was an exciting time and I was mesmerized the by this world of music and sounds.

Hochspannung at the „3 Tolle Tage“ – City fest of Osterode am Harz ~1977

The drums where my healer and my live savior. Without drums I would have gone mad during adolescence! So, once I got into drumming, I focused most of my time on music, playing drums and working on sound systems and recording music. It was an exciting time and „Hochspannung“ became the local heroes of my hometown in those days…

Hochspannung at the „Jugendzentrum“ in Osterode ~ 1974

Besides Drum and Percussion, I was always very intrigued by sounds. Using literally almost anything that made a nice sound to include into my drum set, I spend hundreds of hours, listening to music. This lead to a great interest in sound recording and engineering – and finally to my first sound studio, which was a Tascam 4-track cassette tape recorder. This was of course just the beginning, and soon I upgraded to a reel to reel 8-track + Atari computer system and finally to a PC based digital audio workstation. I recorded quite a few albums under my own name and for or with other artists, like Prem Joshua, Milarepa and many others…

In my recording studio of „The Leela Center“ in Dorset, UK

During my lifetime, I also learned to play many other percussion instruments like the African Djembe, Talking Drum, DunDuns, Shekere and Udu. Congas, Timbale, Maracas and Bongos from Latin Amerika and Darbouka, Daf and Dumbek from the oriental culture – and many more from places like India, Australia, Asia. In 2009 I also became a drum circle facilitator (DCF) with Arthur Hull. Facilitated drum circles are a fascinating way to bring fun, joy and share rhythm church to the world and to energize events, congresses and company meetings. I will write an extra section about it!

Healing Sounds

Since quite a while I got especially interested in instruments which produce a lot of overtones, like Monochord, Tampura, Swarmandal, Dan Moi, Tibetan Bowls, Sansula, Handpan, Gongs, etc.

Natural instruments are often creating frequencies above 20.000 Hz, which is well above our ability to „hear“ them with our ears. Instead, overtones resonate with our cells and even the DNA and create a deep harmonious and relaxation state for most people and some are used since thousands of years in (healing) ceremonies specially in Asia.

It is well know that these the sounds of these instruments have healing properties and I use them for Sound Healing, Sound Massage, Gong Bath’s.

Some of the instruments in my healing sound set ups

A little history of Bands I played in:

Besides „HOCHSPANNUNG“ in my very early days I played in many bands with very different styles like NIMBUS (Jazz Blues Rock), HOT LICKS (Bluesrock, Fusion, JazzRock), COMBO (Ska, Reggea, New Wave), KARL HEINE SEXTETT (Dance, Music, Top40, Traditional Brass Music) and quite a few others. Specially in my time in Göttingen, I played in almost every existing band during my time, before I moved on to Munich in 1988.

Once I moved to Munich I played and recorded with TICO FEO (Jazzrock, Fusion), TERRA INCOGNITA (Ethno Fusion), HAMSAFAR (Ethno Trance, Fusion) MILAREPA (Spiritual and Meditation Music) and many other bands and projects.

HAMSAFAR (with Prem Joshua)

In 1994 HAMSAFAR (=Fellow Traveller) was born and in the following years became my first professional musical project. I had met Prem Joshua in the Osho Tao meditation center in Munich in 1992. He was still performing together with multi-instrumentalist Ravi from UK as „Terra Incognita„, and they asked me and my fellow bass player Chintan Relenberg to support them for a concert in Munich. At that time I often played with Chintan on bass, guitarist Shunyam and keyboard player Nadama Nowak from the US in the Munich area for various occasions. So Prem Joshua and Ravi hired the whole band, and we had a great successful concert.

This year, Prem Joshua asked me to mix, play and produce for his next solo album „Hamsafar“. We had a great collaboration and it was a big upgrade for his sound. Soon after in 1993, „Terra Incognita“ was booked for a big concert at the World Music festival in Lugano , Switzerland – this time with Kamal Engels on bass and keyboards and an Italian percussionist. That concert was a great success, and we started touring for the summer in Germany and Italy in varying line ups.

In 1994 Kamal moved to Australia and shortly after, Ravi left the band, refusing to allow the remainding to use the name „Terra Incognito“. Since I had mixed Joshuas previous solo album, I recommended to use it’s name for the new formed band – and „HAMSAFAR“ was born. We started playing under that name with Prem Joshua, Chintan, Nadama, Shunyam and me.

HAMSAFAR played mostly songs of Prem Joshua, but soon, Nadama, Shunyam and me contributed to the repertoire and we toured Europe every summer, from Germany to Denmark, the Netherlands to France, Spain and specially Italy. We build a fan base and became quite famous in the meditation- and upcoming World Music scene in Europe.

In October 1997 we started to record our first (and only) CD in the beautiful Meditation center „La Magia“ near Grosetto in Tuscany, Italy. It was a long process, due to very diverting schedules of the band members, but in springtime of 1998 we mixed and finished the album „Lifeprints“ in my recording studio in lower Bavaria and we had it ready to sell during our summer tour in 1998. This year was a successful tour for Hamsafar. Although Shunyam had left the band after the recordings of the album, as well as Nadama, who moved on to Maui, we found two brilliant new members for the band: Manish Vyas, Tabla player, singer and keyboardist from Pune, India (who had played tablas on all of Joshuas solo albums) and Dinesh Allan Mattuck from Denmark/US on guitar and keyboards. With these new additions we played bigger and more successful concerts in 1999 and build a strong reputation for a powerful band. We had a lot of new material from our own album, as well as Joshua’s hit „Shiva Moon“ from his album MUDRA (which I had mixed in my new studio in Osho Leela in the UK). Our stage appearance became even more professional and the peak was our appearance at the „Shantipi“ world music festival in Israel with more than 20.000 people.

Unfortunately no band picture of this amazing festival

We had our act together, I thought, and expected to really play more and bigger events, and finally make money, after spending a lot of time, effort and passion – but our band crashed in 2000, when there was growing discontent amongst the members and after a serious talk, Joshua left and the band blew and I was smashed.

The final line up – Manish, Dinesh, Chintan, Joshua and me (left to right)

The TranceDance Era

In 2002, I met my dear friend Harshil Filippo Chiostri, a brilliant percussionist and Didgeridoo player. Both of us were deeply into Shamanic TranceDance, presented by Frank Natale, a Neo Shamanic pioneer of the 80’s and 90th, who took many shamanic practices from Africa, North & South America, Siberia and Asia back to Europe, where the Christian religion had eradicated or assimilated most of the Pagans rituals (similar to the Islamic religion in the Arabic countries.

From this time on we started playing together a lot and gave birth to a mutual CD project. After some years and many meetings, lot’s of travelling to his seminar house Podere Amarti, countless recordings and edits – 2010 we finally released our first TranceDance album RISHI & HARSHIL – „Forget Your Limitations“. 80 continuous minutes (12 tracks) of deep, groovy, trancy, mystical music. An epic journey, which became quite a hit in the TranceDance and Conscious Dance scene and is still used world wide by many Ecstatic Dance DJ’s.

In 2014 this was followed by „Shaman’s Return“ – A Shamanic Experience Meditation. A one hour long shamanic meditation in 5 Stages: Shaman’s Breath, Shaman’s Dance, Shaman’s Journey, Shaman’s Stillness, Shaman’s Walkabout

2019 we released Rishi & Harshil – „Remember Your Freedom“, another masterpiece with 11 songs and 110 minutes of shamanic trance, powerful rhythms and sounds on 2 CD’s. This time the songs became even more trancy, mystical and haunting. On Bandcamp.com we offer all our albums in both 440 Hz and 432 Hz, which became a big „thing“ in recent years. Quite some people feel music, recorded or played back in 432 Hz, is more relaxing and enjoyable…

You find all our music on bandcamp.com for listening and download

https://rishiharshil.bandcamp.com/

My recent projects:

RISHI & DHWANI

(TranceDance, Ecstatic Dance, Conscious Dance, Sound Healing, Gong Bath’s),

I met Dhwani in 2009 at a World Music Festival in Sweden. We quickly figured that we are musical brothers and began to play together on various festivals and started organizing TranceDance tours all over Europe.

Dhwani is a gifted keyboard-, piano- and flute player and vocalist. He recorded many CD’s, specially in the New Age genres, but also Shamanic Titles as well as Meditative music and special CD’s for Hypno therapy.

For our TranceDance events, Dhwani is creating the spacious sound spheres and melodies, While I am responsible for the rhythms with drums, vocals and percussions. Together we create a wide range of spheres to send dancers on deep, intense healing journeys.

Besides TranceDance and Ecstatic Dance we also accompany 5Rhythm and Concious Dance events with various teachers like Olivia Palmer, Julia Knezevic, Roland Burkert, Oliver Euchner and others.

Another specialty are our „Healing Sound Bath’s“ with a huge variety of very spacious, delicate, rich overtone instruments like Monochord, Tibetan Bowls, Dan Moi, Hang and other Handpans and Gongs

Soundhealing setup

RISHI & SHAKYA

Shakya and I met in 2014 at the „Art of Being“ Festival in Czech Republic. It was another „Love at first sound“ affair. We had a very immediate musical connection and began to organize concerts and events together. Shakya moved to Switzerland the year after. Thus we started playing many events in Switzerland, like the Ecstatic Dance Festival Zurich, the „Church“ in Zürich and in his new domicile „Schloss Glarisegg„, where he took the job of the management for the next 4 or 5 years.

Besides Ecstatic Dance, 5Rhythm events and Ecstatic Dance we offer Mantra Singing Events, Sound Healing and Cacao Ceremonies with live music

In the meantime we also play as a trio, together with Dhwani, as well as with keyboard player Samy Bucher from Zurich.

Shakyas sunset concerts at Lake Constance at the boat house of Glarisegg

Shamanic TranceDance

Since the late 90’s, one of my main passion is „Shamanic Trance Dance„. I facilitate TranceDance since more than 30 years and always with Live Music. To me, Live Music is an essential part of healing processes! Music played alive, especially improvised music – performed by skilled, gifted, sensitive musicians – takes the dancer/participant into a deep healing space – the „HERE and NOW“! You tap into a different energy field – spontaneously created… Besides the magic, that can happen, when musicians and dancers get into „the zone“, as we call it…

Shamanic TranceDance offers a wide field of experiences, that hold a sacred, healing quality in a very easy way to access with a few, simple tools…

The six Tools

I identify six (6) main tools to access a state of Trance:

IntentionBlindfoldBreathDanceMusicTrance

Intention

Intention is, in my humble opinion, one of the most underestimated powers in the world. If your intention is clear, all your energy is following directly into that direction. The Huna (Hawaiian Shamans) postulated the „seven principles“. One of them states: Energy flows where your attention goes.

If you have a clear intention, your journey will direct you right to the experience you need…

Blindfold

TranceDance – the way I learned it from my teacher Frank Natale – is done with eyes closed, wearing a bandana (blindfold)! Closing our eyes is the straight way inside. Instead of getting distracted by the outside world, you use your inner eyes.

When you shut off the sense of seeing/looking, a lot of extra energy is freed for the view inside. All other senses get more „sens-itive“: hearing, tasting, smelling, feeling, skin, touch… Normally our eyesight takes up a lot of energy and attention from the brain and awareness. Once you shut out the eyes and look inwards, you get much more aware of what is going on inside you. Your awareness of the body is multiplied and you often move in a completely different way.

Trance and Trauma

In my experience, our body has access to our memories. Memories are not stored in our brain, but in our muscles and organs. That’s why many people suddenly remember situations from their past when they dance intensively. Sometimes memories, they had suppressed for many years. This was very much my own experience, when I tapped into TranceDance almost 40 years ago. And what happened? I was actually witnessing traumatic childhood experiences and could embrace them, integrate and heal many wounds in a very simple and holistic way… And that is, why many people developed conscious dance techniques like 5Rhythms, Open Stage, Soul Motion, Movement Medicine, etc.

Well, I don’t claim, that one can heal all their traumatic experiences, but for my own development I am certainly deeply grateful for healing, I have experienced.

Dancing blind is also very much connected to our sense of trust! Can I trust that I will not bump into other people, or them into me? Can I trust my sense of orientation and don’t run into walls or other obstacles? Can I actually trust without controlling through my eyes? Can I allow my body to move in it’s own way. Am I afraid to actually touch, or be touched? Am I allowing myself to „be danced“?

Besides – Dancing blindfolded means, to dance alone – with and for myself for two hours – without the need to connect with other people. Which can be challenging for some of us!

Breath

Most people in our society are not used to breathe consciously and intense. The breathing just happens automatically and mostly very flat. When we do intense body movement, it intensifies, but otherwise it is something, that just happens (luckily – otherwise we would die very quickly!)

In TranceDance we use a conscious breathing technique called „The Breath Of Fire“: (not the Yoga version!!!) We breathe in twice deeply and intensely through the nose and then out in one breath through the mouth in our own rhythm. Here is a link, where you can hear, how it is done:

https://rishiharshil.bandcamp.com/track/01-power-432-hz

In TranceDance, we perform this breathing in the very beginning of the ritual for about 3-5 minutes prior to the actual dance. Once you breathe intense and conscious, you already change into a different consciousness! You inhale certainly more oxygen. Yet, in India, China and Japan people refer to a subtle energy called „Prana“ or „Chi“. Wilhelm Reich called it „Orgon“. So when we do intense breath breathwork, we not only inhale air, but also this subtle energy, and this really does something very powerful. This breathing energizes the whole body and awareness and jumpstarts you into the HERE and NOW.

Dance

Dancing is as old as our cultural beginning of humanity. In my opinion it is intrinsic to our human experience. I don’t know of any culture that doesn’t have dance and song.