Rasa Brings A Taste Of India Stateside

by Christine Hall

Several years back I was talking to an Indo-American guru, or teacher, who confided in me that he believed that only people who'd spent past lives in India would stay devoted to any sort of advanced yogic practice. Otherwise, he said, they'd find it too weird and different from their American cultural indoctrination and would be unable to make the leap in consciousness necessary for the hard work involved in practices such as Kriya yoga.

At the time I shrugged off the remark, but in the years since I've come to believe that there might be some merit to his idea. I've come to believe this not through the practice of yoga (I'm much too lazy for any serious yoga practice) but through listening to music with an Indian influence. I don't know how to explain this without seeming like a kook, but it seems that when I listen to a raga or other Indian music, I find myself being carried away to an oddly familiar world; long ago and far away from 21st century America.

Which might explain why people either love Indian music, or are totally indifferent to it. Like a good novel or poem, either you get it or you don't. Either you have a connection to the culture and atmosphere that traditional music from the subcontinent elicits, or the music is alien and sounds like little more than busy Muzak. To those who have learned to appreciate it, Indian music is full of exciting complexities. To others, the music is monotonous and boring.

I recently found myself being carried back to the timeless space that Indian music evokes in me while listening to the new CD Rasa In Concert. The traditional songs on this album are all on the long side, averaging about eight minutes, and are filled with extended instrumental passages that are designed to invoke a devotional and meditative state within the listener. Although this is a live album, recorded at various locations in and around San Francisco, it has the sound of a studio album, since all audience responses have been deleted from the mix “to maintain meditative quality of the recording.”

The album sounds like there are at least five musicians at play. In actuality, there are only two, with German-born Hans Christian supplying the majority of the playing, handling a total of seven instruments, if “samples” and “live loops” can be considered instruments. Kim Waters supplies rhythm and vocals, using her voice like an instrument that adds texture to the music rather than as a vehicle to define the songs through words.

It's obvious that both are accomplished musicians, a fact that's verified by a visit to the group's Web site. Hans Christian began playing the cello at the age of 9, under a private instructor who was preparing him for admittance in a music conservatory. The young musician, however, had other plans. “Deep in my heart I knew all along that this was not going to happen,” he says.

Christian, fitting for his name, was the son of a Lutheran minister who presided over a church in Hanover, Germany.

“I would steal the key to the church from my father's desk sometimes and sneak into the church to play there at night,” he remembers. “It was dark, cold and filled with terror, but the acoustics were amazing. I am talking about a building in the Neo-Gothic style, big enough for almost a thousand people. So, I would sit in front of the altar, that sacred space, and I didn't know if I was violating God's space or was welcome. I loved those anxious moments and expressed my emotions in wild improvisations.”

While Hans Christian supplies most of the musical backbone of the group, Kim Waters supplies the group's soul or inspiration. Both an accomplished illustrator and singer, she became enthralled with Hinduism in the 1970s when she met A.C. Bhaktivedanta, the founder of The International Society for Krishna Consciousness. She explains: “As a child I remember feeling a longing and pang of separation from God – a spiritual yearning. I was searching for answers when I met Prabhupada (Bhaktivedanta) in the early '70's. I wasn't really attracted to the Krishna Consciousness movement until I met him in person.”

If In Concert, the group's third CD, has a weakness, it's the liner notes. The traditional songs, some coming from the 16th century, are sung in a native tongue, presumably Hindi, but nowhere in the notes is the language identified. This is nitpicking, however, since the renditions, with their extended instrumental passages set off by Waters distinctive vocal stylings, seem to transcend barriers such as language.

Rasa In Concert, on the Hearts of Space label, is available through Amazon.com.