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A JOURNAL FROM SAMADHI YOGA
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 Interview with Krisha Das (KDas)
Krishna Das is a leader in the Devotional chanting or "Kirtan scene here in
the USA. His approach to Kirtan is definitely east meets west. The east
being his time spent in India devoted to the teachings of Neem Karoli Baba. The west is his early influences of Blues and Rock 'n' Roll music. Krishna Das or "KD" as he is called by those around him accompanies his rich baritone vocals with playing the harmonium. His live shows feature high quality musicians, from the east and west. KD and I met up one night over a meal in Seattle, Spring of '99. Joining us was Kathleen Hunt and Steve Davis.
KN: What kind of music did you do before India and meeting up with Neem Karoli Baba? KDas: My main man was Mississippi John Hurt. I used to sit at his feet at the Gaslight in the village and he blew my mind. He was the most incredible guy. He was so sweet and so strong and so happy. He had happy blues; it was weird. Everybody else had something else. He was happy. That time was amazing. All these guys had just come up from Mississippi. KN: What are your thoughts on the phenomenon of music and what it has to do with the human experience? KDas: That's a big question. You must have something more specific in your head. No? You're just trying to fry me. KN: Twenty words or less. KDas: RAM. [group laughter and ahs] KDas: I don't know. Music is a way we make love to ourselves. If you're really good at making love with yourself everybody feels it. Any music that you do with passion and from the heart affects everybody. When I hear Springsteen singing "Thunderroad" I fall apart, completely. And a lot of other great musicians when they sing it's not about the music, it's about communication, you know. It's about this is my experience and they're just expressing it so intensely that it creates a sympathetic vibration in everybody and everybody gets that feeling and everyone gathers around it like a fire on a cold night. KN: Your experience with Neem Karoli Baba was bound to have affected you. Was there any music involved with that, any chanting or singing? KDas: Nah. You know who was doing it? The old ladies. They'd be in this back room; that was really heavy. The first fall I was there was Durga puja a ten day fire ceremony. All the ladies took ten days off and left their families and they'd come to the temple. Every night they would get together in this little room in the back of the temple and we couldn't go in, we weren't even supposed to be around. They would come and start cranking. I had never in my life heard any thing like it. It was so incredible. They'd be just singing these songs and drumming -boomboomcha boomboomcha boomboomcha ... some big fat mama boomboomcha all night long! And then all of a sudden you'd hear aaahhhacha and somebody would scream and some ma had just gone into samadhi in the corner of the room and she was going into a trance and she'd fallen over and they were falling on everybody. It was the most insane scene that you could imagine. I had never in my life been near that kind of intensity. They just cut through everything. They were right in the center of the fire in the heart. They were burning. I used to sit outside the window just completely blown away just listening and they saw I was out there so they cracked the window so I could hear better. KN: Wow. KDas: I was just spastic from it. It was unbelievable. KN: From your work on the harmonium and the tablas and the Indian instrumentation...did you bring that back from India? It's kind of different from Mississippi John Hurt. KDas: Yeah, he played guitar. This music could be played with guitar. It just so happens I can't play guitar very well, and I play harmonium only well enough to play the songs I know or that I make up because I couldn't be the harmonium player in a band. I always have these great musicians who have to play down to me because I can't keep up with them so they have to tune for me and go slow for me because I'm just doing my thing and it has nothing to do with anything.There are people who are 1,000 times better musicians sitting next to me who can't get two people to come to see them. It's the weirdest thing. So, first of all, it has nothing to do with music. I always tell the story, in New York, the night that you guys were there for the big party, right after I sang this Indian guy came up to me and said, 'Oh Krishna Das, Krishna Das, this was so great, so very great. Thank you so much,' and I said, 'Oh, thank you,' and I thought: this is great. I made it with the home boys. And he said: 'I have a cousin. He teaches harmonium. If you'd like some lessons I can arrange. I went, awh, man, come on. But that's the point of it, you know. That's really the point of it. KN: Your last record Pilgrim Heart was released on a major label, Mercury records. So what do you think about your approach to music - the instrumentation you use - and what's going on in music today with the emergence and growth of world music, music from India, Africa, Eastern Europe?
KN: Is there a kirtan scene emerging in the U.S. or the world? KDas: I think there is, yeah. KN: Who are some of the people on that kirtan scene?
KDas: Jai Uttal, Dave Stringer in L.A., Robert Gass. There's a lot of chanting going on. Some of it's
really cool and some of it's a little flakey but it's
interesting to do it without copying India, to try to take
the spirit and let it come out the way it wants to come out
as a westerner, as an American. A lot of people out there
are doing chanting. Every little group does their chanting
but there's not a lot of people doing non-denominational,
non-guru, selling-my-guru type of chanting but there's a few
of us out there doing that. Bhagavan Das also of course..
lest we forget the big guy. About five years ago I realized I had to start
singing with people. I was like hiding in the closet. I
would only sing with people from the old days. I knew there was like stuff hiding in my heart and if I didn't get out
there it wouldn't come out of me, I wouldn't deal with it. I
had to force myself. So I was looking for a place to go and
I called a couple of places in New York. They didn't get
back to me so I went down to Jivamukti. I'd met David and
Sharon when Jai played there a few months before, Jai Uttal. So they said they had this satsang on a Monday night
and that I could come and sing. At first I would sing for
the first 20 minutes and David would give a talk and a
meditation and that was going on for a couple months and
then they went to India and when they got back I wouldn't
let them say a word. They sat down behind me and I just sang
the hour and a half.
(to top of page) |
KDas: It's interesting you asked me that because the first two cds I did, somewhere in my brain was the thought 'this is a world music record' because I was in South Africa; I produced a project down there. I got friendly with Hugh Masekela and some of the great musicians down there. So it was my thought to break out of the Indian music thing by using congas and African drums. On Pilgrim Heart there's only a little tabla, which we added later. I wanted to get out of the classical Indian music thing. I didn't want anyone to confuse us with that, which is hard to do. So on those two cds there was something in my head. On the new cd it's just straight ahead chanting. I had no thought of making it a world music record. The more I'm singing the more I'm giving up any kind of ideas about that kind of stuff. I just want to chant. I just want to sing. And any way it comes out is OK. I would use guitars -and we used bass on some of this stuff - its just that people might have a weird reaction to that. They might think 'who the f--- is this guy? What does he think he's doing: guitars and chanting, come on!' But I like the harmonium; we'll see.