The oldest Gong Camp in North America, featuring the world's most complete Gong advanced training syllabus, is now coming to Europe with a fresh and exciting format!
What is 9Ways Gong Camp?
In a nutshell, this program is about ‘everything Gong’, and your relationship with it. An intensive week of Gong studies examining its historical roots, therapeutic benefits, metaphysical dimensions, various types and styles of Gongs, accessories, extensive practice exercises, and much more.
Led by Mitch Nur, PhD, one of the main authorities in Sound Work and Gong culture worldwide, this inaugural European edition features a plethora of remarkable ingredients that will make it a must-attend event for anyone serious about Gong playing, and as a plus, a blissful and celebratory gathering in the beautiful Portugal.
Gong Camp Powerful Mix:
✨ Stellar Instructors: Learn from internationally-acclaimed Gong artists, scholars and creators including Mitch Nur, PhD, Mike Tamburo, Thomas Orr Anderson, MA, Xin Yong, Suzie Prize, Madhava Carrara, Margherita Cioffi, Mallika Paritosh, MA, Anika Petrovic, and more to be announced!
✨ Intensive Practice: To ensure that every participant can make the most of the approximately 6 hours of direct practice per day, there will be a Gong available for each participant.
✨ Advanced Academic Instruction: Each day, we will cover a theoretical aspect of Gong studies, ranging from its origins to the instrument’s physics. The tuition is led by esteemed members of the 9Ways Academia Faculty.
✨ Embodiment, Active Meditations & Energy Practices: Often overlooked in Sound Work programs, each morning, Mallika & Gopal will lead bodywork sessions to open the bodies of Sound Workers to higher levels of awareness, fluidity, and receptivity to the other aspects of the program.
✨ State of the Art Gongs: You’ll have the chance to practice on some truly exceptional Gong Art pieces and a variety of gong types.
✨ Chillout in Nature: Take in during the program the magnificent natural and historical setting of Quinta São José dos Montes, with its beautiful gardens, animals, saltwater swimming pool for relaxation, and one of Europe’s largest lakes just 5 minutes away!
✨ Performances & Celebration: Experience magical evenings filled with dance, celebration, rituals, live performances and an unforgettable Closing Ceremony!
Instructors
Senior Instructor and Spiritual Director of 9Ways Academia, and Drup Shen Pa (Bönpo title), Mitch Nur, PhD, has spent nearly 5 decades as a Ethnomusicologist, Sacred Sound Researcher, Practitioner and Teacher. Referred to as the 'Indiana Jones of Sound Healing' by many of his colleagues, he is an authority on Sacred Sound instruments and applications as it pertains to ritual, ceremony, sound therapies, shamanic healing, meditation, and personal transformation. His engagement with the compassionate teachings of the East, combined with his shamanic training, gives him a unique perspective among today's teachers.
Mike Tamburo is a world-renowned musician, composer, artist and educator. He is known and loved for his transformational live concerts performed on his personally curated set of gongs, bells and other metal instruments.
A lifelong multi-instrumentalist, Tamburo has focused his talents on metal percussion instruments, string instruments (hammered dulcimer, guitar, zither, shahi baaja), as well as electronic instruments (synths, looping). Since 1994, Tamburo has shared more than 2,000 concerts and workshops, and has recorded over 70 albums.
Thomas Orr Anderson, M.Sc. is a science whiz and a natural born musician. He earned bachelors and masters degrees in physics, as well as continuously traveled the globe seeking lessons from indigenous Healing Masters. He always seeks magical locations to record his music and the sounds of Nature. For two decades, Thomas has been a devoted explorer, student and teacher in the nebulous field of sound healing, also exploring architectural acoustics and archaeo-acustics and the acoustical properties of fundamental geometries, including the Platonic solids. He is the author of 4 books and the founder of PhySionics.
Yin Xiong, originally from China and currently residing in South Africa, has been a Sacred Sound Practitioner for over 30 years. Known as the Gong Ambassador, in the late 1980s she brought her gongs and sound music to Southern Africa and later to the Middle East. In 2014, she became the first and only person to introduce gongs to Saudi Arabia, offering private services, community activities, and public performances. As a sound and music meditation practitioner, Yin Xiong has performed on various stages worldwide. Her "Opera of Sounds" provides uplifting and inspiring sound journeys with a welcoming tone. She is an active member of the world's leading society for sound music facilitators.
Mallika Paritosh is a poet, a Philosophy scholar from the University of Buenos Aires specialized in Tantric philosophy, a composer of meditative music, a classical pianist and Music Educator from the National Conservatory of Buenos Aires, a Sound Therapist, as well as a certified Meditation facilitator. As a researcher, she has focused her research on the use of Sound, Dance and Trance in the context of the Matrifocal cultures of the Paleolithic. As a musician and dancer, she has performed traditional music and dances at a wide variety of festivals for 20 years and now plays more than 45 instruments. She is the Director of Operations of 9Ways Europe.
Gopal is a certified SkyDancing® Tantra teacher, a certified OSHO® Meditation and Divine Healing Arts facilitator and a certified Shiatsu practitioner. He is also active in many different artistic lines of work: as a rock musician (he recorded 11 albums over the years), event organizer (he produced thousands of shows, major and underground festivals, conventions, and workshops all around Europe), DJ, teacher, and facilitator, constantly experimenting and combining the 3 Tantric Keys (Breath, Movement, and Sound) with innovative meditation techniques.
Presenters & Performers
Grotta Sonora is a project for the design and construction of hand-crafted experimental musical instruments. Madhava Carrara and Margherita Cioffi, artisans and musicians, started this project building on their personal experimentation with sound, using different types of metals. Their first instruments were crafted in a cave of Etruscan origin near Calcata, an ancient village in the Treja Valley. The cave proved to be the perfect place to play these newly-crafted instruments, thus launching the Grotta Sonora project. Grotta Sonora's vision is to create different sonic environments in unique locations around the world, recreating the magical resonance and harmony found in their grotta.
After years of exploration and learning various skills like Reiki, Tai Chi, and Yoga, she has discovered in Sound a path that has opened doors to a new level of knowledge. For the past decade, she has been dedicated to helping people live healthier lives through the power of sound. She is a renowned sound massage and gong practitioner who offers Gong relaxations and transformative journeys with Gongs worldwide. She is the founder of the Galactic Gong Vision Team and serves as the Architect & Sound Association - Gong Serbia. Additionally, she is the proud owner of Galactic Gong by Anika Petrovic, the first specialized store for sound healing in Serbia.
Suzie fell in love with the way of the gong 12 years ago, finding the Gong Bath to be both a wonderfully therapeutic and a blissful experience. She is a Gong artist out of Great Britain who assists in the Gong Master Training with Don Conreaux and Aidan McIntyre. She treasures a large collection of big Gongs offering Gong Baths, Sound Meditations and Chant circles on a regular basis in the UK, showing great skill and presence.
What makes 9Ways Gong Camp unique?
This program explores the tonal alchemy and metaphysical approaches with an emphasis on how to use the Gong’s frequency domains as a psycho-acoustical entry point for shifting consciousness. The Gong technician who can reach a place of non-conceptuality and locality can use the Gong as a wheelhouse to alter Time and Space.
The Syllabus
Inner & Outer Instructions
The basic structure of this syllabus covers many parts, starting with gong stands, mallets and assorted striking implements, exercises on all types of gongs, exploring the sonic universe from drones to attacks, the essential use of sound and no sound, followed by advanced workshops which penetrate the inner understanding of this instrument. The Gong is a very complex instrument and developing a useful skill set, combined with deep listening can lead to extraordinary acoustics.
Intensive Practice
The best avenue of learning is through direct experience, this was, and is the methods that were taught in the monasteries, ashrams, mystery schools and temples from the distant past to today. We feel that learning a subject has many dimensions, and the student requires the most straightforward methods through experience, to sharpen the Sword of Wisdom. During the dedicated practice time of at least 5 hours per day, each student will have the opportunity to test more than 50 different gongs.
Theoretical Foundations
Sprinkled throughout all this practice and play time, is dialogue on the philosophy of Gong play and the most refined research on Gong history available today, led by 9Ways Academia Faculty. We will also have a ‘science of metals’ workshop, which is an examination of the physics of the Gong, including some wave theory and other insights that explain ‘why and how’ the Gong is what it is.
Substantiation & Advance Training
We do not teach a specific philosophical jargon in regards to the Gong. The Gong is one of the most powerful sound instruments in the world and is it’s own philosophy, which is why it has been adopted by many of the world’s spiritual traditions. No one spiritual tradition can claim this instrument. Because the Gong is capable of erasing all conceptions, it can also transform all conditions.
We ARE ONLY teaching you the Gong, without mixing in any other instruments, taking away valuable time, to learn the most about the Gong.
Who is this Program for?
9Ways Gong Camp is an important step for all those new to the Gong, as well as those who are playing and using the Gong in personal practice or for groups. A strong foundation and knowledge base is a necessary step in becoming proficient with this instrument, and allowing yourself to be stretched further, by new ideas and concepts broadening and enriching your expertise.
The emphasis is to make everyone who attends this program gain more wisdom, enabling them to become self assured in their abilities with the Gong. You will leave this program knowledgeable, empowered, elevated, and confident.
Daily Schedule
Gong Camp Europe has been conceived as a comprehensive global program to elevate gong musicians in all aspects, including presence, body awareness and fluidity, practical skills, academic and scientific knowledge, deep listening, and exploration of the unseen aspects of the gong and its potential.
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Embodiment・Movement・Energy Practices
Active meditations and embodiment practices with Mallika & Gopal.
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Breakfast
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Morning Practicum
3-hour practical session led by the program’s instructors.
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Lunch
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Theoretical Foundations・Conference
1 / 1.5-hour theory session led by the 9Ways Academy Faculty teachers.
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Afternoon Practicum
2 / 2.5-hour practical session led by the program’s instructors.
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Dinner
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Listening & Celebration: Live Performances
Live performances by the presenters and instructors of the program,, and enchanting evening events.
Reserve your place
Please visit the event website to learn more about the program, tuition and acccommodation options. Spaces are limited and will be filled quickly. To secure your spot, please fill out the Registration Form on the website at your earliest convenience.
