Spirituality & Longevity in Indian Classical Musicians
http://www.gurukul.org/index.php
music is not for entertainment, it is not fashionable, not image saturated, and it transcends all of that. It came before all modern nonsense. The modern world has tried to seep into the music and turn it a certain way, but Indian musicians keep it very traditional, the way they learned it. It is for your body, mind and soul, and one of the things that is great about all the masters living , and there are not many living these days, is that they are able to be open channels for love and compassion to come through them.
I think it is karma based. You are born with this gift to some extent and then it is up to you to harness that ability and I think he has worked his entire life to do that to the level of mastery where he can leave his body or consciousness while he is playing, letting the music flow through him, so that he is a listener too, without effort, that is what mastery is, to be an open channel, and I hope that one day I can do that too. My grandfather used to say that you play and devote yourself so much to the ragas that you forget the time of day, your surroundings, the place you are in, your name, everything. You completely surround yourself with the raga, to reach a higher consciousness, a higher realization, and enlightenment through music.
In order to achieve that, the music has to be very pure. The emphasis has to be on real pitch, rhythm, tuning. It is a whole different level that many people miss today, especially with junk music today. It is fun, it is enjoyable, it gives you an emotion feeling, but it is not so fine tuned. Like when a yogi or monk fine tune their bodies and minds so much, clear their minds, so they can be open channels. Like my father, he has so many memories, so many people around him, but he can clear all of that when he plays.
My father says that he wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for the music. The spiritual side of it is self evident, explanatory. If you listen to a real classical musician, when you listen to it, when you hear it, you will feel it. To intellectualize it, to talk about it, you can do only so much, but when you hear it, the places it can take you musically surpass all other genres of music. Indian classical music can take me there, and keep me there.
A lot of people are trying to merge this music, fuse this music with other forms; but I think that is just the medium through which people listen to music these days: through machines, beat machines for example. There is so much electronic music around us, and it is made and processed through beat machines, made electronically, through patches. It is a reflection of the generation today - we seek a quick fix, we have no time to meditate, no time to get in touch with old traditions. In modern society, we pick up our Yoga Journal magazine, we wear our T shirts with deities on them, and that makes us spiritual. You can hear a song, and it makes you feel a higher power, and for a moment touches on the full potential of what music can be. This is why I don’t think classical music fuses that well with electronic music. It is not pure music at that point. It is then a mix. I don’t think it is wrong, but I don’t think it should replace classical music. It would be tragic if people only listened to that, a fusion album …….”
This young man expresses so eloquently what my views are. Indian music is above geography and religion.
Indian Music tunes up the 7 chakras of your body, you live at a super human state — where is the time for wine woman and song (just to quote an old adage)!
AND THAT IS WHY DEAR FRIENDS INDIAN MUSICIANS LIVE AS LONG AS THEY DO!!!!!!
Al
