Category Archives: Postcards from the Journey

Postcard 11: Coming to the Qila at Sultanpur Lodhi

05 Sunday Feb 2012

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Last July there was a story in the news from Kerala that spread quickly all over the world. Jewelry, gemstones, gold, silver and coins worth billions of dollars had been found in vaults below a Hindu temple. For centuries devotees had brought offerings and the collection grew and grew. One family faithfully safeguarded the treasury through the many cultural and political upheavals and now the government of India has decided to intervene. The many rare artifacts, including an eighteen-foot gold chain that weighs more than ten pounds, will challenge the team assembled to assess their worth.

Nirvair Kaur with Iqbal Singh, Siri Sevak Kaur, Sat Kirtan Kaur, Harshdeep Singh Walia and Harbhajan Kaur.

It is amazing to imagine how this could happen. Swarms of ordinary people walking around doing ordinary things, taking care of the necessities of life, doing business,  practicing rituals and ceremonies, never realizing that beneath their feet was a huge fortune that had been carefully collected and maintained by those who had the foresight to protect it. However, no one was actually benefitting from the wealth and the vaults had not been opened for over one hundred years.

The story of this tangible treasure is not unlike the story of the intangible treasure. How many people are even aware of the heritage that exists, where to find it, who knows about it, why it is valuable? How long has it been since the ordinary people have had a chance to see the riches for themselves? For the few that know about it, is it enough to preserve it under lock and key, or is the intangible heritage for enjoying, engaging and enriching? How many are aware that something as magnificent as an eighteen-foot gold chain is even possible? The two volumes of Gurbāni Sangeet are a vault like this. This week I’ve been travelling, but the few moments I’ve been able to spend with the sweet shabds of rāga āsā recorded in Volume One have been refreshing and renewing and a reminder of the insight of those who composed them.

I’m in India with my daughters and granddaughter preparing to join Bhai Baldeep Singh and other students at the Qila in Sultanpur Lodhi for twelve days of music practice. This will be the thirtieth gathering of this group from India, Italy, Canada and the United States that has been meeting twice a year for nearly fifteen years for a hands-on experience with the intangible heritage of Gurubāni Kirtan. This is the first time we have met in India and it is an opportunity for the international group to connect with the people and projects Bhai Baldeep and the Anad Foundation are working with in South Asia.

Arriving at the Delhi airport and descending the stairs into the sea of humanity waiting in the immigration lines I realized what a rare privilege it is to have learned about this fortune and to have the opportunity for a first-hand experience. It is like being invited to join the panel of inspectors assembled to view and assess the value of the hidden treasure in Kerala. I feel fortunate, indeed.

Postcard 10: Overwhelmed Underground

29 Sunday Jan 2012

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Going through the songs in Gurbani Sangeet is like mining underground. Having heard there are rich veins of precious minerals there, and having seen with my own eyes some of the jewels the mine has produced, I have gone underground to see what I can find.

You can’t go into the mine unprepared and empty-handed. You need someone to take you, show you how it’s done, give you the tools to do your work, give you the eyes to recognize the valuable ore when you see it, give you the knowledge of how to extract what you find. You need a teacher.

A pick and shovel might be good tools for getting started, maybe even some dynamite, but once you get to the ore you have to know what to do. How do you pry the secrets from the rock and what kind of fine tools can scrape away the sediment without losing the hidden gems?

Of course, after discovering the treasure trove, the real value comes from carrying the riches forward, polishing them, enjoying them in the light, sharing their awesomeness with others, wearing them as a decoration. But this process has been like enjoying the discovery underground in the mine. Having imposed a timeline on myself to get to the end of the tunnel, it is like exploring the cave, learning what is there, making note of the crevices that will take some more time, planning to return later. I’ve been guided through similar tunnels with my teacher, Bhai Baldeep Singh, many times, and this solo journey reveals the learning so far, both what has been grasped and where more practice is needed.

Other miners have been exploring there before, too, and each has left their mark. Teachers, scholars, musicians, translators, website designers, there are so many people who make this adventure possible. There are so many resources in the community and online to support the work of the seeker.

I feel overwhelmed most of the time, but it is a good way to be overwhelmed, like a princess whose jewelry box is so full there will never be enough hours in the day to try on all the exquisite pieces. There is so much treasure here, how can one begin to enjoy all of it? Well, one piece at a time is the only way to start and this week has touched on the seminal modes of raga asa.

So I return underground, pick my way through, satisfied to be in the mine, grateful to have been given access, imagining the splendor of all of these gems, polished, set with intricate ornamentation, gleaming, fully crafted, exquisite.

Postcard 9: Hey Girlfriend!

23 Monday Jan 2012

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“Come on girlfriends, let’s make virtues our charms”: This bāni from Guru Rām Dās comes in gauri mājh, a rāga with all twelve notes. The teentāl rhythm sets a joyful pace.

The mystical poetry in Siri Guru Granth Sahib often uses the metaphor of the spiritual seeker as a bride, the congregation of seekers as girlfriends and the Formless One as the beloved spouse. What if the girlfriends got together to join the saints, be peaceful and loving, cultivate virtue, and fill their minds with thoughts of the Infinite? It would be so different from the girlfriends who bicker and fight about one thing or another, holding each other down, instead of helping each other up. Women who support each other are a powerful force. What would happen if the congregation of seekers (both male and female) behaved more like supportive girlfriends and sisters, bringing out the best in each other?

This weekend I received in the mail a book I had ordered several months ago. It is a history of Amritsar and the Golden Temple, a collection of historic primary source writings and images from foreigners who had visited there in previous centuries. Many of the visitors remarked on the kirtan, something they felt, a mood that prevailed, a mystic presence.

It is something I have felt too, visiting these shabds, hearing the masters sing, trying to sing along. This kirtan heritage is such a rich treasury but yet the girlfriends and sisters sometimes seem so busy disagreeing, judging each other, caught up in proving themselves right, that the family jewels are at risk of being left unattended, slipping away unnoticed.

I’m reminded of something I wrote a few years ago in response to some faction reaction that was happening at the time:
Sing Together
3/29/02 Tucson
Come let’s sing together
The praises of our beloved Lord.
We’ve been brought from different families and homes
To live in harmony under the same roof.
The songs of praise will heal our wounds and troubled minds
With the ointment of His love.
Our Husband Lord is the Only Doer.
He made each one of us and intimately knows each heart.
It is He who invited us to come,
And set our feet on the path we now walk.
He leads us on the journey to His door
And Himself is the Only Judge.
The brides in waiting don’t need to spend their time
Gossiping and squabbling
About the merits and demerits of each other.
Let’s remember to be the brides and servants
That will draw our Master near to us
Not drive Him far away.
We have a great home to care for,
Many household tasks to perform,
And our own weddings to prepare for.
We can serve together the One we love,
Tell each other what we know of Him,
Sing together His Beautiful Song.


Postcard 8: Gora meets Gauri

22 Sunday Jan 2012

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Day 21
The shabds in rāga gauri are big, monumental songs with dramatic intervals, a stately pace, and profound presence. Bhagats like Kabeer, Nām Dev and Ravidās sang in rāga gauri as did Guru Nānak, Guru Amar Dās, Guru Rām Dās, Guru Arjan Dev, and Guru Teg Bahādur. Variations of rāga gauri include gauri guāreree, gauri cheti, gauri bairāgan, gauri poorbi deepki, gauri purbi, gauri sorath, gauri mājh, and gauri mālā,

Singing through this collection is challenging and rewarding and it will be nice someday to return to these songs, spend more time there, learn them well, remember them. Working out the melody from the notation is like approaching a puzzle and solving it can be so satisfying.  However, the joy of singing a song that has been taught is a totally different experience. The meditation goes deep when bāni is sung from memory, without struggling with melody, rhythm, or placement of words.

In the midst of the grand gauri shabds is a somewhat smaller song in gauri bairāgan purvi ang. It is the third composition given for this bani. The first two are in chartāl and jai tāl, this one is in choti teentāl. This is one of those previously learned shabds that goes deep, circling like a drill to penetrate the mind and the heart. “By what virtues will I meet the Lord of Life oh my mother? I have no beauty, wisdom or strength, I am a foreigner, without wealth, without youth, without a master. Have mercy! Searching and searching, becoming bairāgan, for your sight I travel and thirst. Merciful to the meek, kind Lord, Nanak’s water is the sādh sangat, my thirst is quenched.”

In gauri mālā this jewel was found: “Kirtan is my treasure. You are nectar, you are praise, you are beauty, you are love. You are so very near.”

http://www.sikhnet.com/audio/gun-keerat-nidh-moree-gauri-mala-chaar-taal

Postcard 7: Pineapple Pizza

18 Wednesday Jan 2012

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Day 16
My husband likes pineapple on his pizza. Along with the typical bread, tomato sauce and cheese, he likes to add pineapple, green chile and onions. It is a surprising combination that actually works, a fusion of flavor where none of the ingredients loses its own identity. Biting into a slice, the taste is definitely familiar savory pizza, but then there is the sudden juicy, sweet reminder that pineapple is also present, holding its own, merging in the total experience.

This is what comes to mind in trying to explain the experience of discovering a shabd in rāga gauri sorath. Really? Gauri and sorath together? And yet this is the original heading recorded in Siri Guru Granth Sahib for this bāni from Bhagat Kabir Ji. After singing several shabds in rāga gauri in the purvi ang, this one appears. The melody follows the familiar pattern, and suddenly, there it is, that juicy, sweet reminder that sorath is also present, holding its own, and merging in the total experience.

There are other blended rāgas that are more like eating a really good ālu gobi where the spicy sauce brings all the flavors together, while a bite of potato is enjoyed for the taste and texture of potato and a bite of cauliflower still has the taste and texture of cauliflower. It is an obvious and time-honored match. Rāga gauri sorath is less expected, less predictable, less known, and immensely satisfying.

Postcard 6: Acceptance

17 Tuesday Jan 2012

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Day 14
“Let it be, everything is as it will be. No need to hope for heaven or worry about hell. Just sing the praises. Wealth is not to celebrate, adversity is not to cry about.” It is a powerful love when faith, trust and acceptance dwell in the heart. Finishing the shabds in rāga mājh and moving into rāga gauri this theme is threaded throughout the shabds. In the first mājh shabd  in Gurbani Sangeet, Guru Nanak describes the power to change in an instant, the meat eaters eat grass, the dry land runs with water, the powerful king turns to ashes, even the  “natural order” of things is subject to change. And in rāga gauri, the devotees sit steady within their own homes, in fearless acceptance, trusting that the benevolent Doer sets everything right.

Day 15
I woke this morning from a dream in which the kirtan teachers had delivered the verdict,  “she sounds too American.” As a student of kirtan, who came to this practice after the age of forty, I have wondered about the ability to learn to hear, learn to sing this music. When you learn a new language as an adult, you always speak with an accent. Culture and language are imprinted in the first few years of life. What the child experiences becomes a part of the fiber of their being. The mother tongue is one of these things, and music is a kind of language. No matter how sincerely one converts later, or how faithfully one adopts a new language or culture, will there always be a trace of the old, the first love, the first language, the first culture? I can hear the difference in the sound of the original, the traditional, and I do not know if I will ever lose the cultural “accent”, express the actual nuances, or if it is possible. Remembering Guru Nanak’s bāni, by the Grace of God, even the laws of nature can be overruled and maybe this American will sing kirtan. Either way, it will be just right.

As if in response to the morning’s reflection, the evening’s bāni in gauri purbi was presented not once, but twice. Two beautiful compositions, one a dhrupad in the asthai-antarā-sanchāri-abhog format, and one an ashtai-antarā compostition in jai tāla, 13 beats, which I learned from Bhai Baldeep Singh. Whether or not the American accent remains, I am so grateful for the learning which has unlocked these treasures. “By what virtues will I meet the Lord of Life oh my mother? I have no beauty, wisdom or strength, I am a foreigner, without wealth, without youth, without a master. Have mercy! Searching and searching, becoming bairāgan, for your sight I travel and thirst. Merciful to the meek, kind Lord, Nanak’s water is the sādh sangat, my thirst is quenched.”

Postcard 5: Love Poems

13 Friday Jan 2012

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Day 11
Rāga mājh is a perfect landscape for poems of love and longing.  Love is not just one emotion. Along with the quiet joy of union, there are separation’s hurt and longing, calling and searching during times of waiting, and sweet surrender, the sacrifice of the self. Guru Arjan’s letters, remembered in shabad hazāre, appear in raga mājh. When Guru Arjan was sent out of town by his father, Guru Ram Das, to attend a relative’s wedding, he was kept away for an unbearably long time. He wrote a series of four letters, “My mind longs for the vision of the Guru, it cries like a thirsty songbird, my thirst is not quenched, I cannot find peace without the saint’s darshan, I am a sacrifice, always a sacrifice for the beloved saint guru’s darshan. You are so beautiful……..”

These beautiful letters of longing were included in Siri Guru Granth Sahib and preceding them is a collection of seven poems by Guru Arjan’s father, Guru Ram Das. They are in the same spirit of love and longing for the darling beloved, best friend, dear king, true guru, mother and father, my life, my breath, the great giver, sublime essence and ambrosial nectar, the inner knower and searcher of hearts.

http://www.sikhnet.com/audio/madsoodhan-mere-man-tan

Contact with these songs is like contact with greatness. Any great masterpiece connects the viewer with the artist and the kirtan artists are the gurus themselves, the bhagats and other composers, and musicians who came later after being touched by their own experience with the bani and the music. Touching the art is touching the artist and sampling a taste of the artist’s experience, the artist’s perception, the artist’s vision.

Today after attempting to read and sing from the book, I listened to this recording from Bhai Avtar Singh Ragi. The oral tradition is a treasury of memory which has to be heard.  Learning to sing by listening is a totally different experience from learning to sing from written notes. Notation can help ensure that what has been heard can be recalled but it’s not a substitute for hearing. Having listened, singing is an altogether different experience .

I learned today that  different parts of the brain are used for hearing and understanding a language, speaking a language and reading and writing a language. Speaking requires a personal engagement, active participation, it’s different from passive listening. That is why some children grow up understanding a language they have heard in the home, without being able to speak it and without literacy skills. The same must be true for music, which is another kind of language. To be fully experienced, this music must be read and heard and sung!

Postcard 4: Sri Raga Rap

09 Monday Jan 2012

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Day 6, Day 7

To summarize this week’s visit with sri raga:  Delusion, illusion, fantasy, confusion, self-deception, mis-perception, medication, intoxication, clear the mind’s pre-occupation, dispelled by love and meditation, springs a life of contemplation, resonating true vibrations, absorbing One light’s permutation, drenched in peace, sweet liberation. (If I were 40 years younger, maybe I could turn this into a rap.)

In sri raga the Guru speaks directly, scolding and laughing at the same time. How ridiculous the attachment to material impermanent things can seem to the ones who have explored the world of the infinite. Guru Nanak shows the futility of even the aesthetics who seek to find union through all kinds of austerities and powers. To those who want to remove themselves from the world, he takes it to the extreme and points out that even if you lived in a cave for a million years without sleeping and removed yourself from even the sun and moon, you still couldn’t express the greatness of the Name. Or for those who think covering themselves in ashes is a holy thing to do, he asks what if you were ground up and burned to become the ash itself? You still couldn’t express the greatness of the Name. Or for those, who like me, try to find the words to write, he reminds us that even if you had hundreds of thousands of piles of paper, an endless supply of ink, and a pen that wrote at the speed of the wind, you still couldn’t express the greatness of the Name.

Postcard 3: Of all the ragas, Sri Raga

07 Saturday Jan 2012

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Day 4

“Of all the ragas, sri raga is best, if it inspires love for Truth.”

As suspected, this practice is infiltrating many corners of the life. Morning meditation, work at the office, time with the family are all under the influence now.

Today’s first shabd is from Guru Nanak and is a 7-beat tala. “Lest I forget You…” What if I see the vision of wealth, of exquisite artistry, of mansions, of power, of dedicated devotees and forget you and your name doesn’t come? Can I see the One in all? When everything is going well, when there is prosperity and abundance, do I see with gratitude and remembrance? What if it’s not going well? Do I see what is unchanging, unaffected by the sensations of this moment, this situation, this beauty and wonderfulness or this pain and misery? The unchanging is the same regardless.

The second shabd for today is from Guru Amar Das and is in dhamar tala, 14 beats, singing in sri raga about sri raga. “By meditating on the Guru’s shabd, the tongue becomes true, the mind and body become true, and the work becomes true.”

www.sikhnet.com/audio/har-bin-jeeu-jal-bal-jaau-sri-raag-roopak

Day 5

Awaking from a dream this morning there is a sense of connection of life, the elements, the earth, the cosmos, pulsating through me, through you. Is this the flavor of sri raga? I remember the movie Avatar, an image of a world where life is known in relationship to all of nature, it is something like that that this morning.

Continuing to circle back to the songs previously sung, revisiting and revising, practice moves forward as well.  Today’s shabd is a familiar shabd in raga kalyan that has been placed in a 12-beat sri raga composition. This is Guru Arjan Dev Ji’s bani, gun nad dhun anand bed, the virtues of nada, the music, the bliss, the knowledge that appears, the speaking, the listening, meeting with the company of the saints.

I am overwhelmed with the wealth of beautiful songs, one after another, each offering its own unique involvement with the raga and with the poetry. Some of these ancient  melodies came along with the bani (words) from the gurus themselves, some melodies came from musicians who were present with the gurus and added additional melodies for singing the gurubani, and other melodies were added centuries later as new generations of musicians contributed the songs that flowed from their own experience with the words and music. The musical and spiritual vision of these composers is evident in the masterpieces that have been remembered.

Postcard 2: Distilling Sri Rag

04 Wednesday Jan 2012

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Day 1

In the book, Gurbani Sangeet, the ragas are arranged in the order in which they appear in Siri Guru Granth Sahib. There must be a reason Guru Arjan Dev Ji chose to begin with Sri Rag (after the initial prayers). Sri Rag is a raga of the yogis, the renunciates. The ascending scale is pentatonic and the mood is introspective. Bhai Avtar Singh and Bhai Gurcharan Singh chose to begin their book with this song in chartal from Guru Nanak, “Make good deeds the soil, and shabd the seed. Irrigate it continually with the water of Truth.” This first song offers guidance for preparing the mind and heart to sing, to “become such a farmer that faith will sprout.”

I have heard this shabd and recordings are available, so beginning to sing is not difficult. If you would like to hear Bhai Avtar Singh Ji sing this shabd, here is a link.

www.sikhnet.com/audio/mat-jaan-mehe-galee

Day 2

The universe seems to be supporting this New Year’s resolution to sing these songs. I’m grateful for the support and encouragement of family and friends. And it’s great to have a teacher that can offer musical instruction as well as technical support for starting a blog. Many thanks!

The second Sri Rag shabd is from Bhagat Kabir Ji and the raga, in teental, moves a little differently. I found a partial recording from a demonstration by Bhai Baldeep, the rest is learning from the notation. After a few repetitions the song is coming and it is a beautiful melody. “The unstruck melody plays on the strings, by his glance of grace, lovingly absorbed in naad”. Kabir compares the yogi’s union with the process of distilling the essence of a pure nectar. I wouldn’t have understood this metaphor before, but now that I’ve watched Gurumeet’s process of distilling essential oils, it is an imagery I can grasp: capturing the steam in the golden dome, trickling onto the tongue, drinking the intoxicating essence.

Day 3

“You are me and I am you–what is the difference between us? We are like gold and the bracelet or water and the waves.”

There are two compositions given for this shabd, one in jhaptal and one in teental. I have sung and listened to the jhaptal melody before, and there are recordings available. This could easily become a favorite. The teental melody is unfamiliar, so I work it out with the notation. After singing it several times, the rhythm and placement of the words in the antaras still need some work, so I’ll sing it again tomorrow.

I’ve decided to try to sing the songs at the raga’s own specific time. Sri Rag is an evening raga, to be sung between 6:00 and 9:00. The habit of evening practice is a new one to cultivate.