Contact
Nicola Kelsall at Spiralling
T: 01623 466302 M: 07595 628379
Email: nicola@spiralling.co.uk

Press Release – Immediate
7 May 2009

Breaking the Sound Barrier…

A Nottinghamshire woman is celebrating after becoming the first person in the UK to be awarded the Certificate in Sound Therapy qualification.

Sound Therapy is a complementary therapy which uses frequency and resonance to treat physical, mental and emotional ailments. It combines techniques from a variety of cultures to produce a treatment tailor-made for each individual.

Sound Therapy has been practised as a complementary therapy for around twenty years in the UK and is becoming increasingly popular; however, there are few training courses available and only two which award a recognised qualification.

Nicola Kelsall, from Sutton in Ashfield, was among the first four students to study on the Certificate of Sound Therapy course offered by the British Academy of Sound Therapy (BAST) and has become the first person in the UK to be awarded this qualification, entitling her to use the title “Sound Therapist”.

Studying for the qualification involved 8 hour round trips to Bognor Regis for tuition for 18 months, studying modules on tuning forks, drumming and mantra, as well as written assignments and practical assessments. Nicola also conducted research into insomnia and Sound Therapy, using volunteers from the Nottinghamshire area.

Nicola says “I’m thrilled to be the first qualified Sound Therapist in the UK. Sound Therapy is such a versatile therapy and I know first hand of the beneficial effects it can have. I look forward to bringing this treatment to the East Midlands.”

Lyz Cooper, Principal of BAST says “Nicola was an innovative and positive student. She was hard working and has a passion for her work and for taking sound therapy forward in the UK. It was a pleasure working with her.”

Nicola runs a local business “Spiralling Meditation and Sound Therapy” with her husband Tom Kelsall, selling instruments with therapeutic uses and meditation items.

-END-

Notes for Editors:
• Nicola Kelsall is a qualified Sound Therapist, as well as a qualified secondary school teacher. She has been teaching meditation to teenagers for several years, and has taught yoga to pre-school children.
• The company website can be found at www.spiralling.co.uk
• For further information or to discuss a feature, please contact Nicola Kelsall on 01623 466302/07595 628379 or nicola@spiralling.co.uk
• BAST (British Academy of Sound Therapy) can be found at http://www.sacredsound.net/ The Principal, Lyz Cooper can be contacted on 01243 544454.
• Pictures available on request.

Lunch time! A veritable feast had been brought by those attending - everyone was asked to bring something vegetarian to share and bring they did! Homemade quiches and salads and dips and falafel and roulade and flans - there was enough food to feed four times the number of people there. We all had a good lunch, sitting together and chatting, finding out more about each other. It was a lunch of sharing in more ways than one. We shared the food we brought, but more than that. I mentioned at one point I was looking for somewhere to record more CDs - the name of a local recording engineer immediately floated across the table. Someone mentioned they’d like to start keeping bees and suddenly an offer of enough bees to start them off was made!

After lunch we were invited to take part in a mingling exercise, a connections activity. We walked about mingling with each other making increasing amounts of eye contact until we stopped to connect to the person we found ourselves standing near to. We connected without words, just by looking into each other’s eyes. I found this uncomfortable at first, but gradually came to feel more at ease as the exercise went on.

And then it was time to dedicate our craftwork. Having made our medicine bags, we now stood in a circle, a ring of fire (tealights) between us and the altar. Additions to the altar were sage and cedar and dwarf bean seeds (beans?), as well as a lit sage smudge. We took up our chant once again and accompanied ourselves with drumming and percussion. We took it in turns to enter the circle, in no order, but as we felt moved to do so, to dedicate our new bags. We added sage, cedar and a bean for growth to the bag and smudged it in the cleansing sage smoke. The bag was then held aloft as the maker declared their intent. At this, the drumming (which was brought to a slow, soft level whilst individuals were in the circle) rose in energy again and the chant was taken up once more. When all twelve of us had taken our turn we danced around the fire-lit altar drumming and chanting with renewed energy. The dedication and drumming ceremony lasted around an hour - and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one buzzing by the end of it - terrific stuff!

Time now to close the space we opened earlier in the day; a softer, calming moment after our roof-raising moments before.

Some time to chat again, pick up information sheets and tomato plants which were given to us, peruse the crafts and books offered for sale, and then it was all over.

Until next time.

People have always told me I am creative and I have always laughed at the idea, knowing that I lack even the basic skills required to be an artist. Until recently. I’ve come to realise that whilst I can’t draw for toffee, I do have some skill - I simply need the right mediums to express it. For me, this seems to be clay. I’ve spent the last few weeks creating goddess images in clay, with varying amounts of success, and learning what works and improving my techniques until I can produce in clay what I see in my head. And it’s working. I feel like I’ve tapped a vein that was ready to burst. It also seems that I can draw, but again, the medium has to be right. Pastels, those that can be smudged, are what I’ve been using. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m never going to be Monet, but when planning out ideas to produce in clay, being able to put them on paper is a great help. My planning sketches look like the ideas in my head. That’s a first for me!

So, picking the creativity bluebell seemed strangely apt this morning, and also a confirmation of what I’ve been feeling of late.

We then went into a chant, together at first, but then harmonising (and before long, drumming and dancing again) with the words

I am the walking breath
I am the Spirit of the Earth
I am alive and walking
Where I am is beautiful

We were singing it together, each in our own way, and each with the space to explore those words for ourselves.

Before the real work of the day began it was time to open up a sacred space, and we welcomed the spirits of East, South, West and North, Spirit, Ancestors, Spirits of the Green Wood and of the place we had gathered.

Following this we did some grounding, followed by a guided visualisation to meet the Lady of the Green Woods, and afterwards some time to make entries in our journals. So much done already, and it wasn’t even lunch time!

Craft is always a great way to celebrate the turning of the wheel and today’s project was making a medicine bag. This was not a bag for healing in the traditional sense, but instead a personal token of where we want to be and who we are. This intention was sewn into the bag itself, with each stitch; it’s use planned before it came into being. The idea behind these bags was not that they would become a collection place for lovely things found on our travels, but that they would be a changing representation of our goals; that there be a time to let go of some of the contents as our needs and aspirations changed.

I set out with an idea in mind of a lovely buckskin bag decorated with delicate beads, much akin to some of those on display. That’s not what I have however. I have a small buckskin bag, but when it came to the beadwork I realised that this bag neither wanted nor needed it. It is a simple bag, hand stitched and closed with a shell to keep the lace in place.

Today I attended a Beltane workshop, the first I’ve ever been to. Recently (well, for some time really), I’ve been realising that I’ve been neglecting my spiritual side because our lives are so busy. I’ve felt the lack of it, and it took getting close to breaking point to make me see that nothing is lost, but lots is gained by taking time out for oneself.

So, a few weeks ago I booked a place on a workshop run by Glennie Kindred. I first became aware of Glennie more than seven years ago, when a dear friend gave me one of her books, “A Hedgerow Cookbook”. A few months later, when I was leaving Wiltshire to relocate to the East Midlands, this same friend gave me another of Glennie’s books “Sacred Celebrations: A Sourcebook”, which is a book I read and come back to time and time again. I hadn’t realised, over the last seven years, that Glennie in fact lives very close to me - just half an hour away.

Around a year ago, another good friend left a leaflet on my desk, which turned out to be a booking form for Glennie’s workshops (obviously my friends know what I need, even if I don’t!), and although I was interested, I never got round to doing anything about it. Never one to take no for an answer, this friend posted this year’s forms to me a couple of months ago. I put them to one side, but found them again whilst looking through some paperwork and realised that it was time. So I sent my form and cheque off the same day and instantly felt better about everything!

So today was the day and I went along with no clear idea what to expect. There were just 12 of us in all, which included Glennie and the other three women who were leading the workshop. In the middle of the room an altar of fresh flowers and small sacred objects was laid out on the floor, with chairs set around it in a circle. When everyone had settled themselves in, we were immediately on our feet for a quick freestyle drumming session (several of us had taken our drums along, and others were provided, along with a variety of rattles and other percussion items). We started off slowly, tentatively, but before long hips were swaying, and spirit was finding voice. We danced around the altar playing drums, shaking rattles and singing out - a great energetic start to the day.

Each of us was then given a lovely wire bound journal - a handmade paper cover, and really think paper that will take paints or any other medium we each choose for recording our journey. And then, time for introductions, with a different.

A bag of card bluebells was passed around, each holding one word. We introduced ourselves and talked about the “quality” we had selected. We couldn’t see what was written on them when we chose them, but they each seemed very fitting for the people who cose them - no-one was surprised by what they had. Mine was “creativity”.

So it has finally happened. After 18 months of hard work, 8 hour round trips for tuition, mind-bending and soul searching written assignments, practical case studies and a dissertation, to day I received my official qualification.

My certificate arrived today - I am now the proud bearer of a Certificate in Sound Therapy; a recognised qualification which gives me the title of Therapist. Oh, and I’m the first, and so far only, person to have received this qualification. I was in the first intake group for the course, and the only one of that group to survive to the end. There are others hot on my heals. The training for this course takes in three different modules, in turn giving the therapist a wide range of tools to choose from when tailoring a treatment to a client. You can read more about the sound therapy I offer here.

So that’s it. I’ve never used the letters I already have after my name (BA, PGCE - in case you were wondering), but I shall be using my new set of letters, at least on my business cards and marketing. I’ll now be Nicola Kelsall Cert ST (BAST) BRCP (Sound) which, I think you’ll agree, is a bit of a mouthful.