Young Burmese Nuns Chanting Their Lessons

In 2005 I was a part of a recording project in Burma. The goal of the trip was to document older monks, nuns, and lay people describing their meditation experiences. We called this The Wisdom Preservation Project. The vast majority of those recordings were in Burmese and have yet to be translated. Happily, we were able to record many jewels of wisdom for posterity before the these elder practitioners passed on (some of them have already).

Throughout this trip we stayed in monasteries and retreat centers and so I had the good fortune to record some young nuns as they were studying their lessons. Chanting is used as a memorization technique. Part of the training of Theravadan monks and nuns includes not dancing, singing, or making/listening to music or any kind of entertainment show.  So, while they don’t think of this chanting as music, there is voice and rhythm.  Though this is a more traditional Buddhist context than Dhamma Gita, they are both young people are using sound and Dhamma together. Here are the nuns and their chanting: