i do love a playlist! ambient prayer has become something we do at grace every so often. it suits the autumn and winter months i think – a dark quiet space. the idea is simple – a structured contemplative space that goes through 5 phases – settle, descent, meditation, silence, ascent. it gets a full explanation here. ambient music that is generally very ambient and beatless provides the soundscape.

once you have made a playlist that sort of guides the experience. you move on when the music changes.

i have lost count of what number we are on but i called this playlist ambient prayer 6 – listen on apple music or spotify. we’ll add the grace order with tracks to the grace archive soon i am sure but how the tracks relate to the order are as follows:

while people arrive:

• aspen – somniscape
• drafting hindsight – ezekiel honig
• talisman – snufmumriko
• hh.3sv – zaké

settle:

• fragment loop – rhucle
• listen – halftribe

descent:

• less – nils frahm

meditation:

• show through – k leimer
• black swallow i – chihei hatakeyama

silence:

• 1/2 singing bowl (ascension) – jon hopkins (just play bell and fade to silence)

ascent:

• clear light – goldmund and keith kenniff

afterwards to keep vibe of space for a bit:

• evening song – digitonal
• triada – boozoo bajou

quite a few of the tracks are this year – if you like this sort of thing snufmumriko, halftribe, rhucle, goldmun and kenniff have all had albums that are really gorgeous.

there is also always a visual idea. this month’s idea was resting in a hammock in the wood. i have found when i get in a hammock it can to and fro for maybe 15 minutes before settling which seems a good metaphor for settling into stillness, silence, prayer. we did use a video but it didn’t quite work so think i’ll try and make that again. but i love this still image of a hammock suspended in the wood.