Want to move from
Frustration...
to Freedom?
Access your intuition reliably
explore your natural musicality
play It Your way
Want to move from Frustration...
to Freedom?
Access your intuition reliably
explore your natural musicality
play It Your way
What you get...
a one-of-a-kind program carefully crafted to:
- give you solid training & support for your creative journey,
- strengthen your inner creative connection,
- access to evoke fresh potential you may have never imagined,
- enhance your self-awareness, grace, compassion, and adaptability.
3 sessions/month
You get reliable, ongoing support with a guided, grounded and well-paced process to get you through the inevitable ups and downs.
And Reflection and Integration Week deepens and sustains your transformation.
holy trinity of improv
Learn to improvise music (and your life) masterfully, mindfully and musically.
t.a.p. the takeaways
Guideposts, inspiration and prompts for each session detailing specific steps for your focus throughout the process.
Experience improvisation in a new context.
Connect and reimagine fresh possibilities all along the way.
bi-weekly group calls
Join into bi-weekly calls with others working with SoundYourSelf.
You're not alone in any of this. It's reassuring when someone asks your question perfectly or empathizes with your experience.
5-point alignment
This tool assesses how connected you are with your creative source.
Develop your awareness of the quality of your creative connection in any given moment.
Then use the 7-Step Tuneup (→) to resync.
Vibe tribe membership
Swap stories with your traveling companions, explore together, access members-only content, enjoy discounts on future goodies, and receive and offer support along the way.
7-step tuneup
This tool reconnects you to your creative source energy at any time.
Learn the confidence of knowing the 7 things to DO to consciously and proactively tune back in to your inspiration, intuition and creative genius.
What you get...
a one-of-a-kind program carefully crafted to:
- give you solid training & support for your creative journey,
- strengthen your inner creative connection,
- access to evoke fresh potential you may have never imagined,
- enhance your self-awareness, grace, compassion, and adaptability.
3 sessions/month
You get reliable, ongoing support with a guided, grounded and well-paced process to get you through the inevitable ups and downs.
And Reflection and Integration Week deepens and sustains your transformation.
holy trinity of improv
Learn to improvise music (and your life) masterfully, mindfully and musically.
t.a.p. the takeaways
Guideposts, inspiration and prompts for each session outlining the Touchstone, Application, and Practice for your focus.
Experience improvisation in a larger context and connect and reconfigure different aspects of yourself as you would most prefer.
bi-weekly group calls
Join into bi-weekly calls with others working with SoundYourSelf.
You're not alone in any of this. It's reassuring when someone asks your question perfectly or empathizes with your experience.
5-point alignment
This tool assesses how connected you are with your creative source.
Develop your awareness of the quality of your creative connection in any given moment.
Then use the 7-Step Tuneup (→) to resync.
Searchable VIDEO
Easily find and review moments from coaching sessions, online courses, and Question Sessions.
Focus less on "locking onto" information being presented and more on deep listening.
Vibe tribe membership
Swap stories with your traveling companions, explore together, access members-only content, enjoy discounts on future goodies, and receive and offer support along the way.
7-step tuneup
This tool reconnects you to your creative source energy at any time.
Learn the confidence of knowing the 7 things to DO to consciously and proactively tune back in to your inspiration, intuition and creative genius.
explore playing online
We are currently exploring the possibility of being able to play together online!
Imagine playing music, in time and in sync, with others over the internet! This is a game-changer, for sure!
What would it feel like to be able to...
Sit at a piano and play your heart out!
Make something up on the spot.
Play for a while at a friend's party.
Explore your own inner landscape.
Speak through music.
It's easier than you think!
My family name is Daniel Barber.
My spirit name is Two Trees.
I started on piano at 4, early enough prep for a thoroughly musical life, but in my teenage years I also became obsessed with bringing healing justice and love into the world.
Through 20 years spent in social work, quantitative social systems research, computing tech support, video production for nonprofits, and political activism, I collaborated with many incredible people addressing lots of piercing and potent questions.
One that keeps on intriguing and inspiring me is “How do we get from where we are now to where we most want to be?”
----------------------------------
For those 20 years, I didn’t play much music at all. I wanted to get to the piano and teach myself to improvise, but I kept hitting walls and didn’t know where to turn for help, so I kept setting it aside.
I learned all too well the regret of so many years having passed without really playing.
In 2001, I was inspired to come back to the piano and began playing professionally. I went full-time playing music in 2006 and along the way I've learned quite a bit about learning as an adult and about improvisation (both musical and theatrical).
I've come to see that not only is music improvisation fun and engaging, it offers unique insights into how to get from where we are now to where we most want to be.
And THAT is worth learning!
Founder, I Am Sound
What folks are saying...
Is there a framework for this program?
Here are the themes for the 12 foundational modules of the SoundYourSelf system.
Unleash Your Potential
on Piano -- and Elsewhere!
Unleash Your Potential
on Piano -- and Elsewhere!
Why SoundYourSelf?
Why invest your time and resources
in SoundYourSelf
instead of elsewhere?
Why invest your time and resources
in SoundYourSelf
instead of elsewhere?
SoundYourSelf is unique:
- You're liberated to create with confidence in no time - you quickly learn a revolutionary way to know which notes to play (in any key) that will sound good together.
- You learn piano improv AND new ways to relate with yourself and others, because SoundYourSelf incorporates wisdom and perspectives from Compassionate Communication and Inner Empathy work, personal and ritual process work, improv theatre, and decades of group and personal growth work.
- You practice a mindfulness meditation AS you actively engage in creating and "doing" something. It is simultaneously active, passive, self-reflective and self-expressive.
- It offers the opportunity to practice relationship skills while you are by yourself.
- Because you are creating non-verbal sound, you can express yourself out loud, which can be cathartic, and also hear the sound coming "from" the piano and feel "heard."
- It is a unique space that invites you to explore your inner world safely and courageously beyond your comfort zone.
It's not only about...
Most music training you'll find anywhere, even the cool approaches online, involve either learning the map of music and/or learning other peoples' music.
SoundYourSelf involves neither of those.
And, SoundYourSelf is about MUCH MORE than playing music.
So is it about playing yourself?
Yes, but that doesn't quite capture it, either. It's about helping you learn how you play life, and then learning to play it the way you really want to.
It's a deep dive into your patterns, habits, thoughts, reactions and responses in different situations. And then you can try out different next steps to create whole new possibilities and experiences going forward.
The music is a way of evaluating whether those experiments are working. In general, your innate musicality can let you know whether what you are playing aligns with your truth or not.
That's a big plus about incorporating music in this process. It's a tool for assessing how well you're doing with your decisions and actions.
Many spiritual teachings involve some practice for experiencing some "transcendent" reality, harvesting something of value, and bringing it back to the "ordinary" world.
The work and play of SoundYourSelf is grounded in both worlds.
While this work draws on and has similarities with some of the practices and teachings of various mystery traditions, SoundYourSelf is accessible, available and affordable.
Also, in addition to the spiritual connection you can nurture with this work, being able to play engaging music on the spot is pretty nice, too!
When you run across the word "improvisation," you might think of comedy improv with roaring audiences or some high-level jazz playing.
SoundYourSelf isn't just about coming up with something that could entertain or dazzle an audience.
It's about stepping into the unknowns within yourself and finding ways to express something of your truth.
The only audience you need to be playing to is you. And therein lies the grace and also, often, the challenge!
Learning to navigate THAT dynamic is at the heart of SoundYourSelf.
And not only do you get to enjoy the exploration into the unknown, you get to enjoy the sounds you make along the way. So it really isn't a performance experience at all, quite the contrary, it's an informance!
Most music training you'll find anywhere, even the cool approaches online, involve either learning the map of music and/or learning other peoples' music.
SoundYourSelf involves neither of those.
And, SoundYourSelf is about MUCH MORE than playing music.
So is it about playing yourself?
Yes, but that doesn't quite capture it, either. It's about helping you learn how you play life, and then learning to play it the way you really want to.
It's a deep dive into your patterns, habits, thoughts, reactions and responses in different situations. And then you can try out different next steps to create whole new possibilities and experiences going forward.
The music is a way of evaluating whether those experiments are working. In general, your innate musicality can let you know whether what you are playing aligns with your truth or not.
That's a big plus about incorporating music in this process. It's a tool for assessing how well you're doing with your decisions and actions.
Many spiritual teachings involve some practice for experiencing some "transcendent" reality, harvesting something of value, and bringing it back to the "ordinary" world.
The work and play of SoundYourSelf is grounded in both worlds.
While this work draws on and has similarities with some of the practices and teachings of various mystery traditions, SoundYourSelf is accessible, available and affordable.
Also, in addition to the spiritual connection you can nurture with this work, being able to play engaging music on the spot is pretty nice, too!
When you run across the word "improvisation," you might think of comedy improv with roaring audiences or some high-level jazz playing.
SoundYourSelf isn't just about coming up with something that could entertain or dazzle an audience.
It's about stepping into the unknowns within yourself and finding ways to express something of your truth.
The only audience you need to be playing to is you. And therein lies the grace and also, often, the challenge!
Learning to navigate THAT dynamic is at the heart of SoundYourSelf.
And not only do you get to enjoy the exploration into the unknown, you get to enjoy the sounds you make along the way. So it really isn't a performance experience at all, quite the contrary, it's an informance!
Most music training you'll find anywhere, even the cool approaches online, involve either learning the map of music and/or learning other peoples' music.
SoundYourSelf involves neither of those.
And, SoundYourSelf is about MUCH MORE than playing music.
So is it about playing yourself?
Yes, but that doesn't quite capture it, either. It's about helping you learn how you play life, and then learning to play it the way you really want to.
It's a deep dive into your patterns, habits, thoughts, reactions and responses in different situations. And then you can try out different next steps to create whole new possibilities and experiences going forward.
The music is a way of evaluating whether those experiments are working. In general, your innate musicality can let you know whether what you are playing aligns with your truth or not.
That's a big plus about incorporating music in this process. It's a tool for assessing how well you're doing with your decisions and actions.
Many spiritual teachings involve some practice for experiencing some "transcendent" reality, harvesting something of value, and bringing it back to the "ordinary" world.
The work and play of SoundYourSelf is grounded in both worlds.
While this work draws on and has similarities with some of the practices and teachings of various mystery traditions, SoundYourSelf is accessible, available and affordable.
Also, in addition to the spiritual connection you can nurture with this work, being able to play engaging music on the spot is pretty nice, too!
When you run across the word "improvisation," you might think of comedy improv with roaring audiences or some high-level jazz playing.
SoundYourSelf isn't just about coming up with something that could entertain or dazzle an audience.
It's about stepping into the unknowns within yourself and finding ways to express something of your truth.
The only audience you need to be playing to is you. And therein lies the grace and also, often, the challenge!
Learning to navigate THAT dynamic is at the heart of SoundYourSelf.
And not only do you get to enjoy the exploration into the unknown, you get to enjoy the sounds you make along the way. So it really isn't a performance experience at all, quite the contrary, it's an informance!
It's about YOU becoming who you are capable of becoming, in all good ways. And that's something for you AND for us all to celebrate! and to engage in together.
That's my invitation to you. I'd love for you to join us on this journey as we struggly humans learn to say to (and with) life...
"Yes, Let's!!!"
Is SoundYourSelf right for you?
SoundYourSelf could be a good fit for you if..
SoundYourSelf probably isn't a fit for you if...
SoundYourSelf is fun, enjoyable, inspiring, engaging and transformative.
It helps A LOT if you are motivated to learn and grow.
If you're curious, this is a good place for you to come nurture your innate gifts.
100% Satisfaction Guarantee for 45 Days*
100% Satisfaction Guarantee for 45 Days*
I want to make SURE you're happy with this.
Try this SoundYourSelf experience risk free for 45 days. If you are not feeling a deeper connection with yourself, your innate musicality and your ability to express it on the piano, contact me to let me know. If you prefer to end the exploration at the end of 45 days, you'll receive a full refund.
Common questions
I can appreciate why you may have that belief, and why that can feel discouraging.
Sound YourSelf Coaching is centered in the idea that music, vibration, sound, life, simply Is. If your heart is beating, then there is rhythm in you, and if you can talk, then you sing.
This course is about evoking YOUR music, which is closer to you than you may think.
Yes, it can help you a lot. Indeed, this is the background I had that pulled me to creating this approach in the first place. It can be challenging, but it can be done. And it is an incredibly wonderful way to grow and step into aspects of yourself that may have been hiding BECAUSE of what you know. It's tricky, but definitely worthwhile. :-)
I originally created the Sound YourSelf framework with piano in mind. Because of the pitch range, layout and unique versatility of that instrument, even beginner piano players can be creating surprisingly beautiful music within this four and a half months.
Fortunately for those of you would like to have this type of experience on another instrument, the core foundation and principles of Sound YourSelf are applicable for any type of musical expression, including guitar, Native American flute, drumming and singing!
So, regardless of the instrument you want to improvise on with more confidence and ease, Sound YourSelf Coaching will deepen that relationship.
My full intention is to support you in satisfying your desire to improvise on piano (or selected other instruments) with confidence and ease.
The program is designed to be engaging and inspiring throughout, but as in any learning journey there are hills and valleys. If you bring your concerns to me when they arise, we can address them with the clear aim of nourishing and supporting your success.
And of course, some of the success depends on you. :-) We engage in a collaborative process here, and it can only really work if we both offer ourselves to it with mind, heart and spirit.
That said, if within 45 days from the commitment of your purchase you have participated in the program as recommended and decide it is not helping you achieve your goals, you may request and receive a full refund.
Bottom line is I want you to LOOVE this experience!
I'm happy to help you find a keyboard that will work for this process. I have a resource I've put together that will lay out the important minimum characteristics and features of a piano / keyboard that will lead to a good experience for you.
It's all about connecting you with an instrument that will help you connect with your inspiration.
Oh my... I'm so sorry you feel that way, and I won't try to convince you here.
I'll just say that, from my perspective, that belief you have doesn't come from the deepest truth of who you are.
I encourage you to look further into this work. I think it could make a big difference for you. :-)
Feel free to reach out to us by clicking here and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.
We do our best to respond within 12 hours, but it can sometimes be 24.
Thanks for your curiosity and we look forward to connecting with you soon.
Learn a path, a process, and a practice for tapping into your unique and precious gift and expressing yourself with ease, confidence and musicality.
Learn a path, a process, and a practice for tapping into your unique and precious gift and expressing yourself with ease, confidence and musicality.
Curious about SoundYourSelf private coaching for you?
The next step is to schedule a Curiosity Call with Daniel. This is a 35-45 minute call that will help us both gain clarity about what is calling you to consider this work, and about what you would most like to get from it.
Once you schedule the call, we'll send some more information and a short questionnaire to help us further clarify whether SoundYourSelf coaching is for you, and if not, what other options may be best for you.
Mostly, we are motivated by the deep desire to support you in aligning harmoniously with your truth.
That process begins now!