Modulation(mod-yoo-LAY-shun)
1. The process of changing from one key to another.
2. In electronic music, the term is applied to a change of frequency, amplitude, or other changes of similar nature possible through electronics.
(Virginia Tech Multimedia Music Dictionary)
Modulation, in music, is the act or process of changing from one key or tonal center to another. You can hear samples of various different kinds of classical music modulations - including Direct Modulation and Pivot Tone Modulation - HERE.
For a person with no music theory background this all most likely sounds like incomprehensible jargon. It's one of those things you have to hear to fully understand, but the truth is you've heard it many times.
Take this song for instance. Listen starting around the 3:00 mark; do you notice the upward shift at 3:17? That's modulation or a key change.
Well, Pir Vilayat Khan (1916-2004), the great Sufi master once said that "Meditation...could be defined as the art of modulating consciousness." The same could be said for prayer or other forms of spiritual discipline. Like a song that suddenly or gradually shifts one key higher, doing the work of spiritual discipline shifts our consciousness a notch or two closer to the "Divine Reality." As lay monk Brother Wayne Teasdale says in The Mystic Hours: A Daybook of Inspirational Wisdom and Devotion:
"To modulate our consciousness through meditation is to allow for its transformation, the change from self-preoccupation to God-realization, from ego-fixation to Divine Love... Gradually, as we learn to fine-tune our normally uncontrolled thoughts and preoccupations, we tune to the Divinity already ever-present in our consciousness."
If you have the ear to do so, as you hear modulations or key changes in the music you listen to this week, let it be a reminder to continue in your spiritual practice. Like tying a ribbon around your finger to help you remember, allow musical modulations to be "a reminder message from the universe" to stop and take a moment to pray or - in some other way - align yourself with Divine Love.
There are some days that call for music which blasts us off into higher dimensions through sharp edginess, intensity and brute presence, while other days call for music that gently centers our being through fluidity, grace and airy spaciousness. Today we're offering a sacred spectrum of sounds filled with fluidity and grace through devotional kirtan music by Portland's Shantala Music and "psychedelic Sufi trance rock" by New York City's Haale in the RockOm Featured Track of the Week.
These two artists couldn't sound more different but are united nonetheless in seva, or service to others through their music. On Thursday RockOm offers a very unique RockOm Podcast featuring an intense yet humorous round table discussion with the members of Shantala.
Haale (as in halle-lujah or jalepeno), is a Bronx-born woman of Iranian descent whose name means the 'halo around the moon.' Her "Psychedelic Sufi Trance Rock" songs are trance-inducing, rhythmically propulsive, and lyrically engaging tapestries that draws on both Persian mystical (including the works of Rumi) and American psychedelic musical traditions.
Haale's 2008 album No Ceiling got a slew of press and made the Boston Globe, Jambase, and Red Alert Top Album Lists of 2008. For more on Haale and to hear samples from her critically-acclaimed album be sure to visit her website and iTunes page.
Featured Track: "Off Duty Fortune Teller"
Click to Play
Lyrics Excerpt: Off duty fortune teller sitting by the side of the river / She got no beads, no crystal ball, and no umbrella / 'Cause she needs nothing but what's inside / She sees nothing but what's in front of her eyes
Most formulas for success in the music industry don't include exiting the lime-light at the pinnacle of one's career, but Matt Malley (bassist and co-founder of the Counting Crows) did just this in 2004. Matt retired after 14 years with Counting Crows just as the band was celebrating an Academy Award nomination for their song "Accidentally In Love," which appeared in the motion picture Shrek 2 Soundtrack.
Matt now follows another path, one focused on the home-front and family. He's now a full time father and husband as well as a record producer, session bassist, ashram keeper and student of the Mohan Veena or Indian slide guitar. Matt is a student and friend of Grammy winner Vishwa Mohan Bhatt and when chance brings them together, is either learning from his music "guru" or recording Bhatt's guitar in his home studio at the family ashram.
Matt has also just released his first solo record titled The Goddess Within. As a longtime student of Sahaja Yoga meditation Matt has infused The Goddess Within with sacred sounds, rhythms and harmonies, but don't expect this collection to be a velvety venture into serene, mystical realms. Matt rocks out when he's blissed-off and proves higher states needn't be all sanctified-sounding. One can be on the edge, pushing the boundaries both cosmically and musically at the same time.
In this exclusive interview with RockOm Matt speaks about the reasons he left Counting Crows, Kundalini energy and Sahaja yoga, learning the Indian slide guitar, his debut album and his musical intentions for the future.
Tom: You're an Oscar, Grammy and Golden Globe-nominated songwriter and a co-founder as well as a 14-year member of Counting Crows. The question is, why does one leave a band as successful as the Counting Crows?
Matt: Good question. Actually it was fatherhood. But when my second boy was born in January of 2004 I just couldn't handle being a missing-in-action dad. My first one was born in 2000 and I missed the first three or four years of his life because we lived in hotel rooms out touring. That was really hard. So when the second child was born I lasted about another year and then I just had to get out and push the eject button. I haven't looked back. The money was good but money doesn't mean anything. We're still friends and the guys in the band are all like brothers, but I didn't need to be away from home anymore. It was grating on my soul and that's why I left.
Tom: How does something that you love so much turn into something you have to get away from?
Matt: When I first joined the band I wasn't married and wasn't a father yet so my life was better suited for touring and traveling like we did. I'm still a fan of ol' Adam; he's a great songwriter and that's why I stuck with him so long, but family came along and it outweighed my enthusiasm for being the bass player in Counting Crows. I didn't want to be the dad that comes home once every four or five months and visits for a couple of weeks and the kids don't know me that well. Even though the band was still fun, my life on the outside changed.
Tom: How did you get started into music?
Matt: When I was about seven years old a guy came to our grammar school and tested everyone in the class to see who had musical talent. He singled me out and told my parents that I needed to start taking piano lessons. I took classical piano when I was seven or eight and also went through trumpet and violin in the school bands through grammar school. That was my first exposure to music. Honestly, I didn't really like classical piano because it was kind of like typing. I had to memorize these pieces and I didn't feel it in my heart, I just had to memorize things with my brain. I wish I had stuck with it because classical music is an incredible art form.
Tom: When kids discover music for the first time and have the opportunity to play an instrument, especially alongside other kids, they discover something about themselves that's brand new. What did you discover about yourself through music that you may not have otherwise?
Matt: It was my first taste of collective awareness or collective consciousness. You're with a group and you all are achieving something harmonious at the same time. That was new to me as a kid... as I imagine it would be to any kid. [Laughs]
Tom: Tell us about your debut album The Goddess Within. How did that come about?
Matt: The lady on the album cover founded a type of meditation that I've been doing for over 20 years. Her name is Sri Matajii. She was born in the center of India in 1923 and is still alive today but is elderly and quiet and has stopped giving public programs. She's was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in the late 90s, though she didn't get it. [She teaches] a technique and a knowledge of the spiritual machinery that we're all born with. It's a universal truth and not from one religion; in fact it ties a lot of the prophets' teachings together. It involves an awakening of what's called the Kundalini or what in the Orient is called the Chi and it resides at the sacrum bone at the base of the spine. Sacrum is Latin for sacred, so whoever named the bone knew that it contained something. The Kundalini is regarded as the feminine aspect of divinity and so the Goddess within is kind of like my term for the Kundalini, the Goddess. The masculine aspect of God or spirit is in our heart as a spark called the Atman in India. The Kundalini is like a gas that rises up and unites with the spark, carrying it up to the fontanelle bone area at the top of the head. Fontanelle is French for fountain, so whoever named that area named it auspiciously as well. This teaching just connects a lot of the world's religions. Even in Christianity, the saints at Pentecost had tongues of fire coming out of the top of their heads but Christians have just seen that as a mystery.
In learning about the Kundalini, I've approached it like a scientist... no blind faith. Smart people don't just believe something that they're told; they have to find out for themselves. When the Kundalini is awakened you feel it as a cool breeze on the palms of your hands and out the top of your head. You could say that the central nervous system becomes integrated with the spiritual nervous system or the parasympathetic, the seven chakras. The knowledge that [Sri Matajii] teaches is really in depth. She's spoken to the Jungian Society and she's a Nobel Peace Prize nominee... you could say I'm a disciple of hers.
Tom: Did you ever get a chance to meet her in person?
Matt: Yes, a few times, but it was very formal. You don't just talk casually with her. I let her do the talking. Back in the late 90s I got to sit with her a couple of times. She knew I was in a rock band so the way she saw that was that I was helping bring vibrations into the music industry. She had asked me about Kurt Cobain who had killed himself a couple of years before. I remember responding, "I think it was drugs that made him do that." And she said, "I think he was frustrated." She asked about a lot of things related to music with me; it was very interesting.
Tom: I suppose she felt you could reach a lot of people.
Matt: Yes and by reaching them it doesn't mean preaching about her yoga. It's just that the presence of being out there puts vibrations into where you are. Wherever you put your attention, the Kundalini will follow.
Tom: So for this CD, did you go into meditation or prepare in some other way?
Matt: I didn't do any exercises or anything like that. We live in an ashram; in fact, I own an ashram with three buildings and our friends who do our meditation live here. We kind of live in vibration so I don't meditate or anything right before playing music. We meditate every morning at day break. The record was just done during the day somewhat spontaneously and when I felt good I would go work on it.
Tom: What are the intentions for this album?
Matt: Rather than clobber people over the head with my one practice, I'm hoping to continue to introduce spirituality to the Western world. I'm interested in Indian culture, the Hindu deities, the great religions of the world including Christianity, Mohammad was a great teacher... I'm just hoping to continue what a lot of artists are doing by introducing a spiritual outlook - without being religious - to the Western world.
Tom: You've expressed interest in Qawwali as well. How did you get interested in that?
Matt: I discovered Qawwali in the 90s and fell in love with it. It's a very aggressive Indian vocal style of singing. When I would do pilgrimages to India and I'd be at my Sahaja Yoga get-togethers, they'd often have Qawwali artists or bhajans or lots of Indian classical music and the Qawwali artists always stuck out to me. They would be almost frightening and wearing their matching hats; I almost consider it the heavy metal of Indian classical music. [Laughs] When I learned about the translation of the words, I was blown way. Qawwali music originated in what was Persia about 700 years ago as Sufi devotional music and has a connection to Islam but it's beyond just that now. I'm just a big fan of that art form.
Tom: You're also studying Indian slide guitar. We interviewed Debashish Bhattacharya last year when he was in Savannah, GA with Derek Trucks, Bob Brozman and Jerry Douglas. It's a difficult art to learn. How long have you been studying this?
Matt: It's really not easy at all. [Laughs] After ten years of learning it, I'm still on the tip of the iceberg. I know that when children start playing in India they'll be doing what's called the alankar for two or three years which is just exercises up and down the major scale before they actually start learning anything. They spend all that time just getting their pitch right. Slide guitar is like that; it's hard to get the pitch just right unless you practice the alankar for a long time.
Tom: Are you going to continue to move forward with spiritual music or get back in with the Crows? What does the future hold for you?
Matt: I'm not all that interested in a rock band anymore. It's a very blunt art form. Not to diss it or anything; a lot of the great rock records are also spiritual records. "Stairway to Heaven" is a Goddess song. I don't know if it's age or what but I'm getting more subtle. I'm reinventing myself and I'd like to give Indian music concerts on my slide guitar some day; I don't know when. I'd like to spend the rest of my life doing that.
RockOm Round-up is a quick glance at what's going on around the world in the areas of music and spirituality...
What music would you choose to die to? - "Ghoulish question, I know, but someone asked me the other day and I keep wondering. The concept of music to die to was introduced to me as a child by Gervase Hughes’s essay on Beethoven in his book Fifty Famous Composers, still the best short introduction to classical music." (blogs.telegraph.co.uk)
Derek Webb's new album pushes some hot buttons - "Some have accused [Christian Musician] Webb of using profanity to grab attention — not unheard of in ministry. Webb defends the use of the word as an effective use of his primary tool: language. And he's willing to be at the center of controversy, something the former Caedmon's Call member is used to." (kentucky.com)
American and Muslim, Sufi mystics band goes global - "With a discombobulating mix of blonde hair and ecstatic cries of "Allah, Allah!", the members of Islamic band Debu sway on stage at a strip mall on the edge of Indonesia's capital. Led by a clutch of American siblings, the band of adherents of Sufi Islamic mysticism have become a perennial hit during the holy month of Ramadan here in the world's largest Muslim-majority country." (Google/AFP)
Hip-hop innovator Russell Simmons seeks world change - "Russell Simmons may not change the world single-handedly, but it sure looks like he's trying. At 51, the hip-hop pioneer, entrepreneur and philanthropist has opened his wallet to causes from funding art and meditation in schools to promoting Muslim/Jewish dialogue to empowering youth to create social and political change in their communities." (chron.com)
"George Harrison of Counting Crows" Releases Solo Album - "Counting Crows founding member and longtime bassist Matt Malley describes his first solo CD, 'The Goddess Within,' as 'intentionally Beatle-esque.' 'I was always considered the 'George Harrison of Counting Crows,'' Malley said. 'I was always flying off to India to meditate and learn Indian music during breaks from touring or recording. This is the result.'" (reuters.com)
RockOm Round-up is a quick glance at what's going on around the world in the areas of music and spirituality...
Dr. Mehmet Oz on Complimentary Medicine: 'Challenge the Status Quo' - "Music has an essential effect on how we feel. During surgery Oz listens to high-energy songs by Bruce Springsteen, but music isn't only for the doctors. During recovery patients are invited to join in music therapy. While singing 'Dream a Little Dream' with recovering patients, Oz explains that singing prompts deeper breathing and healing. " (abcnews.go.com)
Wide Awake - You've read RockOm's interview with John Cooper of Skillet (currently on the homepage), now see a different interview, where John goes a little deeper on the theological Christian elements of their album Awake. (christianitytoday.com)
New 'music therapy on wheels' delivers healing tunes to pediatric patients - "Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA has a new mobile tool to deliver music therapy and help pediatric patients cope with the fear, isolation and pain associated with being in the hospital. The Music Rx unit is a high-tech, interactive studio on wheels that includes everything necessary for music therapy, both in group settings and one-on-one. " (newsroom.ucla.edu)
Why Sleep are a dream band for stoners - "Recorded by Steve Albini, the opening track 'Thebes'... is a reference to the city assailed by tragedy in Greek mythology... Is 'Thebes' an analogy for the state of the world today? I think so. If Thebes retells the story of a city destroyed by insanity, the following track 'Mediation is the Practice of Death' concerns the Buddhist belief of maransati or death awareness, the ability to fully accept death within your subconscious." (guardian.co.uk)
'We preach the message of love through Sufi music' - "We use the poetry of Sufi saints, mystics, and friends of God for our Qawwali performances. We also compose ourselves. As musicians, we can compose each verse according to its mood and the mood of the singing. If the mood is fast, the music is fast, if the mood is slow, the music is slow... Qawwali is a very spiritual and devotional thing. I can say this because we have been in this profession for the past 750 years." (tehrantimes.com)
Today we bring you three new feature interviews with celebrated artists whose music is very distinct, but who are nonetheless connected by a burning desire to share their joy through music.
"I was given the gift of devotional song from birth, raised with the music of the temple, taught to sing and play beautiful instruments and dance... for love and for God," says Gaura Vani, the heralded musician and leader of As Kindred Spirits (which Jai Uttal calls, "Simply the most wonderful kirtan band in the Western world"). See RockOm's interview with Gaura, An Instrument of God's Peace.
The New York Times says, "Liking Brooklyn Qawwali Party doesn't depend on if you know what Qawwali is. Nor does it depend on how you feel about Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, its most revered practitioner. This is an 11-piece band... that piles texture into Mr. Khan's melodies, ultimately transforming them; it's joyous music, and this band adds all the extra fun and funk it knows." Get ready to rocket into musical orbit as we get, High on Sufi Jazz Grooves.
You could say that Sara Watkins' solo debut has been a lifetime in the making. The 27-year-old singer-songwriter, fiddle player and one-third of the Grammy Award winning group Nickel Creek sets out on her own and as you'll discover in her interview with RockOm. Watkins can't quite explain music's ability to bring us all together, she only knows that it does and that music is unavoidable. For Watkins, "Music is everywhere."
Paying tribute to one of the world's great vocalists, Brooklyn Qawwali Party formed to honor the legendary Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, reworking his thunderous songs for an eclectic, eleven-piece orchestra comprised of groundbreaking jazz musicians. Funky, smart, and loving, BQP captures the joyful spirit of this Pakistani folk music in a unique instrumental blend of jazz and Qawwali. With five horns, guitar, bass, harmonium, and three percussionists, this band's buoyant rhythms will be sure to get you on your feet and clapping.
The New York Times says, "Liking Brooklyn Qawwali Party doesn't depend on if you know what Qawwali is. Nor does it depend on how you feel about Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, its most revered practitioner. This is an 11-piece band with brass, reeds, harmoniums, drums and percussion that piles texture into Mr. Khan's melodies, ultimately transforming them; it's joyous music, and this band adds all the extra fun and funk it knows."
Featured Track: "Mustt Mustt"
"For BQP, the meanings of the songs we perform are illuminated within each individual performance. We're not sufis, we are jazz musicians who hold a deep appreciation for this particular music and the spirit within it. Our music is instrumental, not lyrical; we hope to allow the melodies that we play to inform us of the spirit of the Sufi poetry in the moment of performance, and are always discovering through that process." (Brook Martinez, founder and percussionist)
An Interview with Brooklyn Qawwali Party By Tom Crenshaw, tom@rockom.net
The New York Times says, "Liking Brooklyn Qawwali Party doesn't depend on if you know what Qawwali is. Nor does it depend on how you feel about Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, its most revered practitioner. This is an 11-piece band… that piles texture into Mr. Khan's melodies, ultimately transforming them; it's joyous music, and this band adds all the extra fun and funk it knows." Paying tribute to one of the world’s great vocalists, Brooklyn Qawwali Party formed to honor the legendary Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, reworking his thunderous songs for an eclectic orchestra comprised of groundbreaking jazz musicians. Funky, smart, and loving, BQP captures the joyful spirit of this Pakistani folk music in a unique instrumental blend of jazz and Qawwali that will be sure to get you on your feet and clapping. RockOm recently sat down with Brook Martinez, founder of Brooklyn Qawwali Party to discuss the band’s music, the music of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and their appearance on CBS Television special Faith, Music and Culture.
RockOm: Tell us how Brooklyn Qawwali Party came about.
Brook Martinez: Brooklyn Qawwali Party came about in 2004. In college I had become a fan of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, the late great Pakastani Sufi vocalist, who became internationally famous in the '80s and '90s and then died in 1997. Originally I was studying Indian philosophy and Indian music and then I studied jazz and worked at the World Music Institute, which is a non-profit in New York that used to present him before he died. So I had been a fan of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan for a while and I had also been studying jazz in New York and was an active New York jazz musician. Basically, my community of musicians started to pass around a CD of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan without me knowing until they finally came up to me and said, "Hey, have you heard of this guy? He's an amazing singer!" I said, "Of course I've heard of him. I've been listening to him for forever." I didn't know they were interested in that kind of music; I thought they were more interested in Western jazz music. So once I knew that my jazz community was starting to get into him I thought, well this music actually lends itself well or has parallels to jazz music in that it uses simple melodies as platforms for improvisation and it's got a great swinging rhythm similar to jazz. So I thought, well what if we tried playing these melodies themselves - not singing them and not singing the Sufi poetry as Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan did - but actually perform them with our own jazz instruments? So I got five of my horn player friends together, percussionists, someone who could play accordion and eventually change that to the harmonium, and guitar and bass and we tried playing the music and it really worked out. That was back in 2004 and we had our first show that summer.
RockOm: What was the original reaction from your musician buddies? Did they think you had lost your mind that you were trying to unite these two fronts?
Brook: No, the initial reaction was "Yes!" One member found out that I had this idea and he was like, "I have to be in this band." They instantly knew this was something special and they basically sought me out for it. I chose people I had wanted but there was even one musician who heard about it from a friend and was like, "Oh, I gotta do that... that would be amazing." And then at the first rehearsal, the first notes we hit, we all sort of knew and looked at each other and said, "This sounds really good." From the start it was really exciting.
RockOm: Is it just about the music for you guys or do you actually subscribe to the Sufi faith and tradition? Is that something you practice?
Brook: Well, my approach to the band was to go from the music into wherever each person is at spiritually and allow the music to move them in that way. Everyone really has their own different spiritual beliefs. None of us are actually practicing Sufis. But the music from its origins is inherently spiritual and Sufism has an openness by saying that it really is about your own intimate relationship with The Higher or the Divine, regardless of your religion or what you believe in. For me personally, it's about the actual experience in the moment of playing that hopefully will move us into different states of good feeling. Original qawwali is really to get into a sort of spiritual trance or higher vibration through the music. So personally I just open myself up to the music and I've had all different experiences with the music - amazing moments as well as moments where I'm just a band leader managing a band. I think that's reality; every note you play can't be an ecstatic high but if you are open to the music then things can happen. I try to keep the music itself in an open enough format where special moments can happen.
RockOm: Particularly now with what's going on in Iran, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and unrest throughout the middle east, how important is it to learn about eastern music?
Brook: Music is just one part of learning about eastern culture and understanding that for the most part, we're all very much the same. Then there are extremes on both ends that we hear about in the news all the time, with the more intense political and religious movements. But from my experience, I get so much positive feedback from Pakistani-Americans and Pakistani people all over the world who have been very happy about this. I think an awareness is coming about in the West about the East and eastern music. The musical CDs are available, you can watch videos on YouTube, and so the information is there and people know that it's good. From my perspective, the political media tries to create the separation and drama, but it's up to the people, from the roots, to understand beyond that. We're all so similar, with our own ethnic flares, but at the core we're all human beings.
RockOm: We had the opportunity to interview the Wailers not too long ago and I had asked that if you knew nothing about Rasta, if the spirituality was transferable through the music. So let me ask you about Qawwali. If we know nothing about the music or spirituality itself, do you think there's an essence in the music that's transferable, creating a spark with the audience where there was none before?
Brook: When Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan brought this music to the international limelight, no one that didn't speak Urdu could understand the lyrics, but he became an international superstar. The essence of the music was coming through, regardless if you could understand the poetry and if you knew the history of it all. We were all moved by his music, not by the beliefs we knew that he had, but more by the more immediate effect of listening to his music which was enlivening to say the least. I was able to take that as the reason we focused specifically on Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, because he was the one who brought this to the international limelight. We felt almost welcome to take his style of the music and play with it. Just understanding him from interviews and from friends of his, he had a very open mind on collaborating with the West. So for us, it's really about that immediate effect which can range from making someone smile, making someone get up and dance (when they may not have that night), making someone feel inner joy by listening to good music or maybe someone having a real experience with it. And that really is up to the listener and where they're at that day or in that moment in their life. You just never know.
RockOm: One thing undeniable about Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's music as well as the music that BQP makes is that you can't really be still and listen to it. You have to move; It creates a vibration that makes me want to move. It's a very proactive music.
Brook: Absolutely. I'm a drummer and I'm moved by rhythm, that's my thing. With Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan or Brooklyn Qawwali Party, it's sort of that the rhythm and how it moves you that is the basis for it all. It was really important to me to choose this music, as opposed to other religious music that I love that can be more solemn, because it's upbeat, joyous, it grooves and has that intensity. We compare it to Western gospel music because it has that real intense energy that's not so focused on the more solemn side of religious chant but on the energized side.
RockOm: Tell us about the CBS television special that the band was featured on. How did that come about?
Brook: The CBS documentary was a 30-minute special called Faith, Music and Culture. They had found out about Brooklyn Qawwali Party through someone in their office that said, "Oh, this would be a good band for that." They sent me an email and said "We're the CBS Religion Unit" - which I never knew existed [laughs] - and said they were doing this thing with a Christian a capella group, Jewish rappers, kirtan and they'd love to do us too. They came and videoed a local show in Brooklyn and it was great.
RockOm: Tell us about your song, "Mustt Mustt."
Brook: This was one of the first songs that we started playing and one of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's most famous songs. It has actually been covered by Massive Attack, who did a collaboration with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan in the early 90's and he's recorded it so many times. In Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's culture it's just a popular number and so it's one we love to play for everyone.
RockOm: What's the future hold for Brooklyn Qawwali Party?
Brook: The future holds a second album, hopefully coming out in the fall. We're also playing at Lincoln Center on August 12th at 7:30 for their free outdoor festival, which it's a great honor to be a part of that festival. We're sharing it with Susheela Raman who is a fantastic singer from India. That's our next big show in New York and we're just looking to do some collaborating with singers as well, which could be really interesting coming up. The future is exciting for us.
NPR has put out TWO pieces recently that may be of interest to the RockOm community.
1.) LAL MERI
Yesterday, NPR shared about a new "eastern mysticism meets pop" band, Lal Meri...
Lal Meri takes its name from an ancient Sufi folk song, part of a mystical tradition that helped to expand the reach of Islam around the world in centuries past. Ecstatic, transcendental Sufi art forms were used to draw people in through direct experience, bypassing dogma and authoritarianism. And, in a sense, that's just what this unusual trio is all about - unifying listeners of different cultures, beliefs and aesthetics with an irresistibly seductive sound.
See (or listen to) the whole article and hear sample of their groovy, sultry, spiritual tracks at NPR.org.
2.) REACTIONARY RINGTONES SPARK ARREST IN TIBET
Police in Tibet have swept markets in recent months looking for banned music. Chinese state media report that police have arrested several suspects for allegedly downloading to their cell phones music that the government considers "reactionary."
Woeser, who goes by only one name like many Tibetans, is one of Tibet's most outspoken authors. Recently, the Beijing-based writer has been blogging about the hidden world of reactionary ringtones, subversive songs and dissident downloads.
Read more on this important story, including the ban of a song entitled "Dalai Lama", over on NPR.
Well, Pir Vilayat Khan (1916-2004), the great Sufi master once said that "Meditation...could be defined as the art of modulating consciousness." The same could be said for prayer or other forms of spiritual discipline. Like a song that suddenly or gradually shifts one key higher, doing the work of spiritual discipline shifts our consciousness a notch or two closer to the "Divine Reality." As lay monk Brother Wayne Teasdale says in The Mystic Hours: A Daybook of Inspirational Wisdom and Devotion:
There are some days that call for music which blasts us off into higher dimensions through sharp edginess, intensity and brute presence, while other days call for music that gently centers our being through fluidity, grace and airy spaciousness. Today we're offering a sacred spectrum of sounds filled with fluidity and grace through devotional kirtan music by Portland's 
Visit Haale at...
Most formulas for success in the music industry don't include exiting the lime-light at the pinnacle of one's career, but Matt Malley (bassist and co-founder of the Counting Crows) did just this in 2004. Matt retired after 14 years with Counting Crows just as the band was celebrating an Academy Award nomination for their song "Accidentally In Love," which appeared in the motion picture Shrek 2 Soundtrack.
Tom: You're also studying Indian slide guitar. 
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