Yoga for Beginners: August 26 is Musical Yoga Day! Rock on?

August 26 is almost over but, I learned this morning and only now had a chance to share that apparently today in 1967, the Beatles, Mick Jagger, and Marianne Faithful met Maharishi Mahesh Yogi who helped spread the practice of Transcendental Meditation and I assume related practices like yoga in the Western world, including the United States. That was just a few years before I discovered yoga.  To celebrate that day, the email notification I received encouraged yogis to practice yoga with rock music.

I am curious - how many of you yogis out there practice with rock music?  My tastes in music are eclectic and far ranging.  I have to admit that I rarely practice with rock music even though I love all kinds of rock music. I find rock better suited to jumping on my mini-trampoline.

My favorite music for yoga ranges from light classical music (like upbeat Mozart) and classical guitar (think Andres Segovia) to flamenco jazz guitar ( think Jesse Cook, Jesse Cook, and Jesse Cook! as well as Lawson Rollins) to smooth jazz.  No, I don't practice to the sounds of sitars or any type of Indian music of ethereal new age type of music, although I am not adverse to it. One of the readers of my books, Karyl, says that she really enjoys practicing to the album called Putumaya presents Yoga. 

Everyone's tastes are different. Here is what I think is important for choosing music for your yoga practice:

1)  You LOVE the music!

2)  The music energizes and relaxes you.

3)  The music syncs with and enhances your focus on the flow of your movements and breathing.

4)  You feel blissful after your practice.

If you have special music to share, please comment!

Rock on, jazz on, or otherwise do your yoga moves to the music,

 

Laura Venecia Rodriguez 

 

 

Comments

[Tina]

I really lucked out with the Prem Joshua:

My own sequence that is set to a non-instructional soundtrack that is chosen for its bell-curve in tempo from start to finish ... [I find that I will have to skip two tracks on Shiva Rea's Yoga Rhythms ...]

I did 67 minutes yoga practice accompanied by the music (after non-accompanied pranayama), which kept to the tracks very well (After all these years primarily practicing at home, I have this down to a science.) Certainly, the practice was a lot shorter than most that I have done, but I did a faster sequence.

It was hardly any harder than before. (Mild is what I need.) With all the syncopation in this music, you CAN go off-tempo. It's allowed. There's no Master Teacher standing over you with a whip here.

[Laura Rodriguez]

Thank you, Tina! I will pass your recommendations on and check out some of these myself.

[Tina]

I have special taste in music to which I practice soft vinyasa ... I see nothing wrong at all, for instance, with MC Yogi's Elephant Power, but it is hardly a steady diet for my vinyasa practice. Some of the young people to whom that album—and others like it— have been targeted, have introduced me and others to it because they can't get enough of that "Ganesh is Fresh" theme.

I tend to do my yoga to albums geared towards an active but soft practice, such as David and Steve Gordon's Yoga Moods, and Soulfood Music/DJ Free's Yogagroove 2 ...

After many months of using both albums in my practice, I am looking to practice to some new ones: Yoga Rhythms by Shiva Rea, Dakini Lounge: Prem Joshua Remixed by Prem Joshua; and Yoga Sessions: Earthrise Soundsystem. Vinyasa being more dancelike than some other forms of yoga, I usually have to listen to the album several times first, including work-throughs with my practice sequence. I find that once I have edited my (nearly all pre-scripted) sequencing to fit the phrasing of the music, all goes smoothly ...