I first came to Findhorn in 1978 on the recommendation of a Waldorf teacher in Austria, my home country. I was 23 years old, curious, and to save money hitchhiked from London to Scotland. I arrived in The Park to meet my experience week group and after lunch, Peter Caddy, the founder of Findhorn, met us personally, asking our names and where we came from. Then he said: ‘Welcome to Findhorn, YOU ARE FINDHORN!’ This was such an empowering welcome, to know we had been called to be part of this light centre, by resonance, and we belonged here, even if we were just new arrivals!

Living and working in the community I felt I had stepped into a dream that my heart had longed for, but I did not know it really existed! Everything was beautiful: we lived in caravans which were hand- decorated with plant designs on the walls, ate and drank from handcrafted plates and cups from the community’s pottery. The spice jars in Cluny kitchen were each a unique work of art, with a different mandala design each, according to the spice it contained. Love could be seen and felt in every little detail all around me.

In the tea breaks I often went into the garden with my recorder, to ‘play for the devas and garden beings’ as I loved to believe that the fairy world was real and could be contacted. People sometimes said to me on hearing my improvisations: ‘You have so much music around you!’

These comments inspired me on my return to Austria to go and study music. After finishing my degrees in both pedagogy and music I returned to Scotland in 1984 to live permanently in the Findhorn community.

I arrived in The Park just in time for the Spring Festival and met the music group Los Incas, who gave a wonderful concert with South American music in the Hall. At the end of the festival their leader Jorge Milchberg invited me to become part of their band, as they had just lost their flute player and were scheduled to go on a concert tour in France. That was an opportunity not to be missed and I agreed.

It meant that in a very short time I had to learn to play the South American Kena as well as the Panpipes, in order to fulfil my role as the new flute player. We were a small band of 3 men and myself, and I enjoyed being on tour with Los Incas, a band that had come to fame with Paul Simon and his recording of ‘El Condor Pasa’ which was a hit in the 70ties. We played for big audiences in France.

I loved ‘being a star’, having to sign CD’s with my autograph after the concerts. But even though this fulfilled a secret dream of mine, something was missing in this experience. Although the music was lovely and people applauded, the music we played felt like something people consumed, like a good meal. Yet within me I felt a longing for something different, for music to be a kind of communion with a higher power that would uplift and transform both players and audience alike.

When I arrived back in Findhorn to start my membership program in Cluny after the music tour, I delivered a bunch of instruments like xylophones, drums and shakers in the lounge, which I had brought with me in the car. I wanted to contribute to Findhorn being a musical place, imagining that people would start playing whatever instruments they found. But not so, nobody seemed to notice the instruments and they only gathered dust.

So I started offering special evenings for guests and members, where people could learn how to play those instruments as well as learn songs and dances from different parts of the world. This was the repertoire I had collected during my travels and in my studies for Elementary Music Education on the ORFF institute in Salzburg, Austria.

At the end of one of those evenings a German couple came up to me to ask if I would consider giving a music workshop in Germany. ‘Why not?’ I thought. We agreed on a date and 6 months later I drove my car for two days and nights all the way to Hannover, to give my first ever workshop, bringing with me all my instruments in the back of the car. That was in 1987.

This first workshop took place in a Yoga Center and I found out only the night before the start that we had only 3 registered participants. ‘Wow, with only 3 participants I need some help!’ I prayed and connected with my angelic helpers, asking for support. ‘If you think that doing these workshops is part of my divine purpose, please bring in more participants next time’.

During the workshop, together with the German couple and the owner of the yoga center in Hannover we were a group of 7 people and we spent a delightful weekend singing, dancing, learning to play simple instruments and even making up our own songs.

At the end of the course the owner of the yoga center in Hannover was so happy with the weekend that she offered to organise another music course for me, only 6 months later. In the meantime she duplicated the tape we recorded during the first song-weekend, passed it to her Yoga students and on my next visit I found out that this time I had 30 participants! ‘Wow, thank you Universe!’ I thought, feeling relieved.

5 of these new participants were running their own Yoga studios and invited me to do a weekend in each of their places the next time I returned. So on my next trip I had 5 weekends in a row to teach in Germany! ‘Thank you angels’! I thought again and smiled. ‘Now I know that you really do listen’!

Whenever I returned to Findhorn I continued to offer song evenings in the community, but these events attracted only guests, all the members seemed too busy! But by the end of the week all the guests I had been singing with would be gone, so nothing was left of my efforts and the singing tradition did not take roots for many years.

In 1987, the year of the Harmonic Convergence I also visited the Ecumenical community of Taizé in France and got exposed to a most beautiful repertoire of sung prayers. Sitting on the floor of a great church building, together with 5000 other people, in a big hall lit only with small candles and decorated with a few orthodox icons, I was about to be transported to another world.

From the darkness, into the silence, a single voice rang out: ‘Alleluia!’ and 5000 people broke into 4 part harmonies, each knowing their own part, singing and praising God with joy and open hearts, so that the whole chorus of voices was rising towards the Heavens. From then on I wondered how I could bring this tradition to Findhorn, feeling that this kind of singing would fit really well into our lives in the community.

On my return to Findhorn I started to offer Taize songs on a Sunday morning, together with Carol who was a devotee of Sai Baba and brought her own version of devotional chant, using a keyboard and playing in a rock-n-roll style, all in the honour of God. But was still only guests who made it to these song sessions.

One day a woman called Lucy asked if she could do more singing with me before she had to travel back to her home town. I was happy to oblige and suggested for us to meet the following day at 8am, as this was the only free time in my busy schedule.

Then the question came up: Where can we sing? I asked the responsible people if we could sing in any of the sanctuaries in the Park or in Cluny, but the answer was a categorical ‘No, darling! These sanctuaries are only for silence!’

After a few rounds of asking around I came upon Ian Turnbull, our Canadian stone-mason who single-handedly had just completed the construction of the ‘Nature Sanctuary’, using only recycled materials. This building had a grass roof, was nestled in the middle of the Park between trees and bushes and looked a bit like a Hobbit Home. ‘Would it be okay to sing in your Sanctuary?’ I asked. And with a big smile and a big hug Ian answered: ‘Yes, of course, go ahead, sing all you want’!

So I met with Lucy on a weekday morning at 8 am and we sang together through my repertoire of Taize songs and other similar rounds and chants in parts. After an hour, when we completed, I said:

‘You know, singing these simple meditative songs is such a wonderful way to start the day, I will come now every day to sing here, even if it means that I am all by myself! So I did. But word go out and after a while there were several people asking me: ‘Can I too come to sing with you?’ And from then on we have not stopped singing in the Findhorn community for more than 38 years.

To support the guests who came to join in every day I created little songbooks to help them read the words and the melody lines and we used the Taize Books which we ordered from France. In the beginning we were just singing in one voice, sometimes in a round and felt pleased with the outcome. But over the years, as more singers came in on a regular basis, we started each song with building up from the Bass voice, then added the Alto, the Soprano and finally the Tenor line. At some point you could go into the kitchen and hum a melody and others would join in, singing the missing harmony parts.

We usually started with singing three OM’s to tune our voices and connect with our Source, God, the Beloved. Already from that first sound the leader of the day could know how well people could blend their voices. Sometime we had to change our program and do something simple that did not require a lot of singing skill. Yet nobody was ever turned away, and the repertoire grew and grew. It was a voluntary service of 25 minutes in the morning and on a Sunday that time was extended to 90 minutes.

Our guests enjoyed this morning ritual a lot and often took the booklets together with our tapes and later our CD’s to bring the songs into their families and communities. Over the years I recorded 5 song CD’s with booklets for the words, chords, harmonies and dances. These little booklets were later collected into a bigger community songbook with 180 songs. Now there is a second songbook available, a Vol 2 with more new songs.

During the pandemic, when singing was not allowed in closed spaces, the community could still gather in our new Singing Chamber, an outdoor facility with tiered seating, also built by our master builder Ian Turnbull. Our Findhorn and Taize devotional singing survived by going on-line for more than 2 years and brought more people from all over the world in touch with this simple and heartfelt way of singing as a community.

I want to thank especially the Brothers of Taize as well as all my visible and invisible angels who have helped to bring this tradition of Singing in community into being. I feel blessed to have been given the opportunity to shape this part of Findhorn’s rich communal life! May our planet turn into a singing planet so that the Heavens are reflected on the Earth and the Earth may turn into Heaven!

With love and joy, Barbara Swetina. www.sacredsongs.net, www.barbaraswetina.com