Michael Tyrrell knows plenty about jet lag.
As a Grammy Award-winning musician, he often traveled for more of the year than he stayed at home.
"Nineteen years ago, I was on the road playing music 280 nights a year," said Tyrrell. "It's been an interesting road. I'm blessed enough to have always been able to take care of my family playing music, which is very rare in the industry. Somehow I've always been in the right place."
Tyrrell's music career took off when he was a teenager.
"I played with a guy who had one-off hit called 'Key Largo,' Bertie Higgins. I played acoustic guitar on that record. I was only 17. They had to sneak me into the bars. After that I played with a myriad of different people. I did everything from country to RnB, lots of heavy metal and lots rock and roll. It took me out of the country, mostly with a band called Warlock, which was a giant band in Europe."
Living with Jet Lag
Living that life jet lag was just part of the package. Jet lag can be a problem for anyone traveling as far as Europe or anywhere that throws off their natural circadian rhythms-the way the human body is coordinated with the movement of the earth.
Some people are better at adjusting to time changes than others. But for most, moving through different time zones tends to disrupt sleep patterns. It can be harder to sleep at night when it is daytime back home.
Jet lag, and the problem of sleeplessness in general, have given birth to a small industry of sleep aids-from pharmaceuticals like Ambien and Lunesta to organic treatments like melanin, and a range of remedies in between.
But Tyrrell found a sleep aid that requires no medicines, only sound.
The result of his research into the effects of sound on the human body led to his release of a series of recordings called "Wholetones: Life, Love and Lullabies," which recently debuted at Number 3 on Billboard's New Age chart.
The Long and Noisy Road
It was a long journey that led to "Wholetones."
Through his musical activities, Tyrrell became interested in the physiological effects of sound. He did some research and made some remarkable discoveries about the effects of certain frequencies on the human body. But it began by accident.
"I had lost my voice, probably from using it incorrectly, and I went to see a doctor," said Tyrrell.
This was no ordinary doctor.
"He said I can fix that," said Tyrrell. "I sat in the chair and he turned on a machine. He said, 'Where is it hitting you?' It felt like the flicking of a finger."
First, Tyrrell felt it in his breast bone. The doctor adjusted the frequency, and then the sensation moved to the forehead. Finally, it focused on the larynx.
"He said, 'Okay, sit there for 15 minutes. I'll be back.' I could barely talk. In 15 minutes he came back and said, 'How are you feeling?' I said, 'Great!' And then I realized. 'Oh my God, my voice is back!'"
That discovery led to further inquiries into the effects of different frequencies.
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Out of Tune
"I've been playing music since I remember crawling," Tyrell said, "but ever since I was a child, I felt there was something wrong with music. It is the most beautiful vehicle of emotion, passion and power. But there seemed to be a schism. It took me to my late 30s before I started honing in on what it was that was bothering me about it, and I realized it was the tuning. The tuning of A = 440 Hertz is detrimental to how we are wired, through our electricity, our circadian rhythms and how we function."
The realization that standard tuning was not the only possibility "started me down the rabbit hole," he said.
The standard concert tuning and the international standard for manufacturing today is A440. That means the A above Middle C is tuned at 440 Hertz (or cycles per second). Orchestras tune to A440 and everything else follows from that.
But that was not always the case. In Paris during the early 1800s, concert tuning was A=441. In Italy of the mid 19th century, it was A=439.9. During the Baroque period from 1600-1760 or so, A was set to 415 Hertz-a semitone lower than today's standard.
Tyrrell discovered that the difference can make a difference.
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Tuning the Human Body
Everyone knows that music can affect emotional states. Putting on lively music can make you want to dance. Soft music can help to calm you. Music in spas is hypnotic. Tyrrell's research took him beyond the obvious effects as he began to experiment with the effects of different frequencies on the human body.
He came to believe that some frequencies are more beneficial to the human body than standard tuning.
"I realized how specific frequency is, that everything is frequency, everything has a resonant frequency," said Tyrrell. "Every color is frequency. I set out to find frequencies that could really help the body become whole, to find a place of centering."
He wrote a book called "The Sound of Healing" to explain his discoveries.
"Being a musician and playing many 3 o' clock sets in a bar, I tend to be late night person," said Tyrrell.
"It's hard for me to sleep. But when I listen to 'Whole Tones,' I am out cold. When I put on the first one called 'Open Door,' which is tuned to 396 Hertz, it's 22 minutes and 22 seconds long. I've never been past five minutes. By then I'm already gone."
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