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The New Scientist Article Ken mentions ( http://www.newscientist.com/features/features.jsp?id=ns22273 ) is excellent. Worth checking out, especially if you've read "Godel, Escher, Bach". Putting your brain through some strenuous mental excercise! I think it was Neils Bohr who said "anyone who fails to be completely shocked by quantum physics hasn't understood it". I have noticed that playing loops manually (just playing a phrase over and over again) can be quite an experience, and certainly a different one to using a looping device. Sometimes, your fingers just take over, and you can hear the "loop" interacting with the rest of the music. I happen to have a Sheila Chandra CD with me today, so on this subject, I quote from the liner notes: "Sacred Stones: Somewhere all of us intuitively understand the links between ancient musics, that is, that drones and chanting are at the root of all musics. The act of chanting is like throwing a stone into a lake - however small the stone is, the ripples (vibration) it creates affect the whole lake. I believe that making sound can make you 'sound' (whole). Om Namaha Shiva: An ancient chant, a new melody. Shiva is the destroyer of ignorance. I find the 'clever' part of me wants the chant to 'go somewhere' - instead I listen to the harmonics the chant creates, or just to its frail simplicity ... One for all of you to join in with at home!" [from the CD "Weaving my Ancestors' Voices" (RealWord CDRW 24 - 0777 86722 2 7) ] John