Search - Various Artists, Diana Krall, Nona Hendryx :: Visionary Path

The best guided imagery program I've ever found!

Andrew Olivo | Oregon, United States | 09/26/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is an awesome CD that is incredibly relaxing and soothing. It contains five guided meditations. The meditations are as follows:

TRACK ONE: "Rainforest" - narrated by Diana Krall, the Jazz singer. Diana takes us through the Rain Forest. The writing is so wonderful, and the music so perfectly suited for the location, that you really feel like you are there in the Rain Forest (presumably, the Brazilian rain forest).



TRACK TWO: "Desert Nights" - narrated by Nona Hendryx, takes you through the desert at night. As Nona's narration points out, the desert is thought of as being barren, but there is a lot of life in the desert. The particular desert seems to be a composite, because there is reference to the Egyptian Pyramids, but that motif is not elaborated on.



TRACK THREE: "Solar System" - narrated by F. Murray Abraham, the famous character actor and alumni of the Actor's Studio in New York. We are taken into the solar system, and we take the form of a comet. This is perhaps my favorite meditation of the entire program. I love the sense of mystery attached to this particular meditation, and F. Murray Abraham's deep and theatrical voice is perfect for this meditation. The lonely sound effects fit this space exploration very well.



TRACK FOUR: "Mountains" - narrated by Lucinda Bassett. Lucinda is the creator of the famous "Attacking Anxiety and Depression" program, the founder of the Midwest Center for Stress and Anxiety, and the author of the books FROM PANIC TO POWER and LIFE WITHOUT LIMITS. Again, this is a "composite" meditation, in that Lucinda takes us to a symbolic ice capped mountain that seems to symbolize all the famous mountains of the world, the Alps, the Himalayas, Mt. Fuji, etc. The musical accompaniment is energized and motivating. You can almost feel that crisp, cold mountain air. . . .



TRACK FIVE: "Oceans" - narrated by singer Roberta Flack. This meditation is the most relaxing on the entire CD. It takes you into the ocean, and we interact with different sea animals. We hear ocean waves and a few dolphin sounds interspersed with Roberta Flack's soothing voice.



Each meditation is about 10 minutes long. I would highly recommend this CD to anyone looking for a guided program. The production value is excellent! As I mention in the beginning of this review, this is the best guided imagery CD I have ever found."

Absolutely Relaxing!!!

Andrew Olivo | 11/10/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This album is terrific. Great voices by popular artist leads you to wonderful places to relax; go to the Rain Forest, be a comet or relax in an underwater getaway. As a beginner in this relaxation business it was a real treat to be taken so completely. I want more!"

Stunning, colorful, energetic and yet relaxing visualization

Melusine62 | Seattle, WA | 11/13/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you are looking for evocative, vivid, fresh visualizations and like journeying to beautiful exotic places, this CD is for you. I've only listened a few times so far and am still stunned at how much better (better written, more fully imagined, beautifully executed) this is than most such CDs I've tried. Many are either skimpy and uninvolving, or detailed in a didactic way that makes you all too aware of the author/narrator rather than putting you inside the visualization. By contrast, these visualizations are imaginative and abundant, with sights, sounds, touch, even smells vividly evoked, transitions gracefully made, and the words perfectly counterpointed by the music to give a sensation of flowing or rushing or floating through these fantastic journeys. (I normally dislike electronic music, but this music is well-done and really carries the imagery along; also, it is interesting to have the music in the foreground and the interspersed natural sounds in the background, almost subliminal.)



The visualizations have relaxation and affirmation components, but these are so well integrated with the journeys that they aren't obtrusive (nor are the occasional gentle and hopeful environmental messages). My two favorite visualizations are Rainforest, with Diana Krall, and Solar System, with F. Murray Abraham. I particularly enjoyed the enthusiasm of Krall's and Murray's deliveries of these especially captivating journeys, although all the narrations are well written and well executed.



In Rainforest, we travel to the vibrant, fragrant and well-oxgenated rainforest. The fertile cascade of imagery, the bright music, and Diana Krall's dynamic reading are invigorating and calming, and I actually see brilliant colors whenever I listen to this one. It's like being inside a Rousseau painting!



In Solar System, Abraham's voice sounds just like the mysterious, somewhat dramatic narrations I remember as a child from planeterium shows--and with that same magical feeling, we move from a gentle, glowing sunset up into the night sky, and are launched into a voyage in space, traveling as a comet to the outer reaches of the solar system, before returning to earth.



Let's have another CD like this, please! Note: Longer sound clips are available at CD Baby."