You don't need any musical experience to learn the harmonium. You don't need to want to lead kirtan or be a meditation leader, either. Anyone can learn to play a few chants.

Playing the harmonium lets you chant at home as part of your private meditations, and you can chant with family or friends too. It also brings you closer to the chants themselves. When you play a chant yourself instead of only listening to someone else, you can follow your own devotional feeling. You can chant louder or softer, faster or slower, or repeat a line many times to go deeper into it.

Many chants are simple, so start with those. The Chants page lists every chant in Cosmic Chants with its difficulty level. We recommend beginning with chants at difficulty level 1, the easiest.

If you are a disciple of Paramahansa Yogananda and want chanting to be part of your life, just begin. A few minutes a day will bring steady improvement over time.

To begin, you'll need access to a harmonium. How to choose one will be covered in a separate guide.

You can sit on the floor or in a chair. If you use a chair, place the harmonium on a stand.

Bring the harmonium close enough that its left side sits a little inside your left knee. Then your left hand can reach the bellows at the back without stretching, because reaching too far can make your shoulder sore. Your right hand should rest on the keys without strain in your wrist or elbow.

Everyone's body is different. Experiment until you find a position that feels comfortable and natural.

Pumping the bellows

Your left hand pumps the bellows. You can rest your left thumb on the body of the harmonium and pump with your four fingers, or move your whole hand in and out. Use whichever feels most comfortable.

Controlling the volume

The most important thing is to make an even, steady sound and learn to control the volume. While you hold down a key, pumping more air makes it louder and pumping less makes it quieter. Unlike a piano, pressing a key harder doesn't change the volume. Only the pumping does.

Playing legato

As you play the melody, connect the notes. Avoid staccato, where you lift your hand and leave gaps between notes. Play legato instead: keep each key down until the next one is pressed.

When several syllables or words are sung on the same note, hold the key down through all of them instead of pressing it again.

In Door of My Heart, "Wilt Thou come, wilt Thou come" is sung on one melody note, so hold that note through each word.

1. Choose an easy chant

Browse the Chants page or your copy of Cosmic Chants, and pick one of the easier chants. Cosmic Chants isn't on this website. You can get your own copy from Self-Realization Fellowship.

2. Choose how you'll learn it

There are several ways, and you can combine them:

• Sheet music: If you read music, use the sheet music in Cosmic Chants. If you don't, other musical training resources can teach you. Learning to read music is recommended, but it isn't required.

• Piano rendering: At the top of each chant page, a piano rendering plays the melody and lights up each key as it's played. You can hear the melody and copy the lit keys to see where your fingers go.

• Videos: Each chant page also has videos showing a hand playing the chant. You can slow them to half speed in the video's settings.

• SRF recordings: Listen to SRF's recordings of the chant on the SRF YouTube channel or on streaming platforms.

3. Learn the words, melody, rhythm, and form

Aim to memorize the words and learn the melody and rhythm correctly. Then learn the song form, which is the structure of the chant and how many times each line repeats. For example, Door of My Heart has four main lines, and each one is sung twice.

4. Beginning and ending

Once you know the standard form, you can choose how to begin and end:

• A common way to begin is to play the melody of the first line once without singing, then start singing the second time through.

• Play the standard form several times. It can feel natural to repeat a line you want to emphasize.

• To end, choose a suitable line and repeat it several times, growing quieter while keeping the tempo. Then slow down on the last few words to signal anyone chanting with you that you're ending.

When you chant on your own, all of this is flexible. Shape it to suit your own devotion.