Let me introduce you to one of my most profound teachers in my lifetime—the ney. A sacred instrument of the Sufis, the ney is a flute made from a reed which grows along the river banks around the Middle East. Not played transverse (like a Western silver flute) nor vertical (like a recorder), the ney is played diagonally, with both lips interfacing with the mouthpiece. Its difficulty is legendary—some say the instrument itself selects its students.
I have found that the ney takes more breath strength than any other flute I have played from around the world. When playing, I feel like my essence must not only meet the instrument at the mouthpiece, but extend all the way down, through the length of the reed’s body. To awaken the ney requires a phenomenal amount of breath support, which forms the foundational grounding the instrument needs.
The great mystic poet Rumi had this to say about it: “Fire is the voice of the ney—not wind…the fire of love has fallen into the ney.*”
For the mystic, the importance of the ney lies in the fact that it is hollow. The metaphor is that those who wish to be open to divine inspiration must spiritually clean and empty themselves, like the hollow inside the ney. Only then, can the breath of the Beloved cause the ney to sing and come alive.
This ignition, caused by the hollowing of the ney-self (relinquishing of the ego) and communion with the Beloved is the highest purpose of the neyzen (ney musician).
By Mia Baki
http://www.mysticguest.com
* From Vol. 1 Mesnevi of Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi, Turkish translation by Abdülbâki Gölpınarlı, English translation by Nuri Ergenekon and Banu Uslu, edited by Banu Uslu and Mia Baki.
