Dear Friends far
flung and near,
Recently Libana performed at Wellesley
College as part of the
Art and Soul series. Hosting such artistic luminaries as poet Mary Oliver
and Tibetan flutist Nawang Kechong, we were honored to be a small part of this
mosaic of artistic and articulate visionaries. The performance space was low
lit yet the radiance of our audience seated in intimate proximity to the stage
illuminated our hearts and spirit. Attempting to interweave tidbits of story, a
fleeting glimpse into our profound sojourn to India, proved to be a constant
tangle of time management and concisement of word. Each sentence uttered had
behind it a flood of remembered color, nuance, fragrance, rhythm, song,
sunlight, generosity, warmth, welcome, depth and story. There was far too much
tale to spin than an alleged concert could possibly allow - after all, the
point is the music! Each time I spoke I felt as if I were offering the
meagerest of morsels - though most likely the audience did not imbibe it this
way- as I simultaneously relived the splendor of India and edited out what there was
absolutely no time to elaborate upon. True, we are in Pisces time but really,
it was like swimming in a fantastically glimmering sea and having to select
only the smallest of offerings for those gathered.
I had no idea that only 13 days home my
experience would remain so wildly undistilled (and conversely, would I even want it
to be?) and that every Piscean seam in me would want to sit down, draw people
closer, roll out a tapestry of stars, build a fire and gather around to
embellish stories at their fullest to all who had the heart and curiosity to
listen.
On January 8th, the new year just begun,
LIbana performed a
we're-going-to-India-and-here's-some-new-repertoire-we-want-to-try-out-on-you
concert at the ever embracing Friends Meeting House in Cambridge. It was a convivial evening of long
time fans, well wishers and bon voyage celebrants. Libana's show at Wellesley College, a full 2 months later,
represents the other side of the journey with all that has transpired in
between.
In between??
In between Libana sang, drummed and danced
our way through India.
By unplanned candlelight we performed at the venerable Ravi
Shankar Center
in Delhi. The
moment I rang the sturdy Nepali yak bell summoning the commencement of the concert
all electricity flickered to a stop as if signaled by it's deep tonality and
resonance. Staff members scurried to obtain candles. The 6 of us sang on. You
don't need to see to sing. "I arise facing east, I am asking toward the
light" full out into the dark. Candles hurriedly lit and precariously
tilting on various surfaces, the electricity returned. Candles too hastily
snuffed, out it went again. It became clear why earlier, on the receptionist's
desk, we had seen and pondered a large box of candles and a pyramid of match
boxes. Light, dark, whatever, it was a sacred stream of moments to share the
floorboards that have hosted Ravi Shankar, George Harrison and who knows who
all else.
Libana played at the American Embassy
School where we taught
for the first week, sharing the stage with dancing and drumming 4th graders and
singing Middle and High schoolers. After a rollicking rendition of the west
African dance Kakilambe, met by thunderous applause, 85 ten year olds, having
learned what they'd just performed over the course of our residency week, lept
off the stage, eyes aglow and one was heard to shout " We nailed it!"
A fireworks of pride and artistry.
Saturday of that week found us with an
overflow all Indian audience at the American
Cultural Center.
Rapt, nodding and appreciative they burst into whoops of glee when Linda and
Allison emerged in full mirrored sparkling garba garb procured in a swivet of
shopping the day before. This well received concert garnered Libana the most
unique review ever, and we continue to tease Allison, written up as
"looking sexy yet graceful", that these raves about her may be as
close to a marriage proposal as one could ever read!
Journeying south to Ahmedabad we sang in
the sunlit third floor of an artisan's collective, under a corrugated metal
pavilion roof for 2,000 students at the Gandhi inspired C.N.Vidyalaya school, on the
rough hewn outdoor stage at Barefoot College in rural Tilonia joined by
Jordanians, Kenyans and Punjabis - a veritable music of the global spheres spontaneous
festival! We sang for street kids at a safe haven tucked away in a maze of
alleys and cut throughs in the bowels of Delhi.
They thanked us with a Hindi rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
Traversing high into the steep Himalayan
foothills we sang on yet another planked stage, this time at The Children's
Village, a school for Tibetan children living in exile, founded by the sister
of the Dalai Lama. Currently on a 2 month vacation, the 150 children there when
we visited have no family or home to return to. For even the youngest students,
the school is their family and home. Well loved and cared for
by the dedicated faculty and staff, they spend the chilly days playing soccer,
riding bikes and awaiting the joyful springtime return of their 850 classmates.
A new song of ours, Peace Mandala, begins with a lone line of Om Mane Padme
Hum. Tears filled my eyes as I locked into the gaze of a stripe sweatered 7
year old boy chanting chanting chanting the whole way through with me.
This is real I thought, my voice catching.
His schooling is this. Om Mane Padme Hum. The
very foundation of his education way up here in these mountains, 8,000 miles
above sea level, is this. Om Mane Padme Hum.......He is 7. Our words in
beautiful synchrony.
Dressed in dazzling green saris
("This is our uniform. We are tree growers" one woman announced
proudly) the Landless Women's Collective of Ganesh Pur met us with a red paint
dot to the brow, a pressing of rice into the red and a song of welcome. Lunch
was served beneath the trees on comfortable sofas with large striped pillows.
These women have negotiated the stewardship of neglected, arid acreage owned by
the village and have turned it into a lush paradise of vegetables, fruits and
medicinal herbs. Underneath this well tended canopy of trees we sang Now I
Walk In Beauty and in turn they graced our reluctant departure with a lively
heart widening Hindi farewell song, our hands fluttering good bye until we
could no longer catch sight of each other.
We sang in tenements, schools, under the
open night sky, beneath trees and sunlight, where ever the spirit moved us. We
were sung to as well, an exchange of hospitality, mutual admiration, culture,
curiosity, warmth, celebration and some sort of mysterious unbridled love which
passes between people when they approach each other with open hearts, deep eyes
and a wild intuition to move toward each other.
And now we are.....home? Separated from
Mother India and her pandemonious liveliness. Yet, not.
On stage at Wellesley, I was taken by surprise by the
encompassing embrace, the loving hold she has on me. Mother India, her guiding
spirits, loving hearts, challenges and hard work, vision and commitment. I am
broken wide open by all I have seen. The stories continue. This nomadic blog will
remain.
There are our stories and the stories told
to us. So pull up a tree stump, come close to the fire.
We have tales to tell, worlds to listen,
the thread, the story lives on.
In peace, grace and the spirit of this
spinning planet ~
Namaste!
Marytha Paffrath
