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An Evening of Story and Song: The Heart and Music of India
June 11, 2016 @ 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm
$35
Coolidge Corner Yoga and the New School of Yogic Arts Present:An Evening of Story and Song: The Heart and Music of India featuring a meditation led by Mark Whitwell + live music by classical Indian musicians Bruce Hamm, Joanna Mack, and Amit Kavthekar.
$35 suggested donation (all proceeds go to the Heart of Yoga Peace Project and the Farm Sanctuary)
Join us for an evening of vegan food and wine, moving words, and music that stirs the soul, featuring a meditation led by master yogi Mark Whitwell and classical Indian music by Bruce Hamm, Joanna Mack, and Amit Kavthekar. Delight your senses with a live musical experience unlike any you have experienced before. Feel the mesmerizing power of the sitar, sarod, and tabla played by three renowned musicians, and learn to appreciate the ragas (or melodic modes used in classical Indian music) of patterns of notes with characteristic intervals, rhythms, and embellishments that serve as the
foundation for improvisation.
6:00 – 6:30 p.m. – Food
6:30 – 6:45 p.m. – Meditation and attunement with Mark Whitwell
6:45 – 7:45 p.m. – Concert with Bruce Hamm, Joanna Mack, and Amit Kavthekar
Bruce Hamm is a longtime disciple of the great sarod master Ustad Ali Akbar Khan. Bruce began his studies with Khansahib at the Ali Akbar College in India in 1974. In 1981 he performed the traditional thread tying ceremony to symbolize his bond to his guru. Bruce has performed numerous solo concerts across India and the U.S., and enjoyed the rare opportunity to play onstage with his guru and some of India’s leading tabla players. Today Bruce is one of a handful of disciples and few Westerners chosen as a primary lineage holder and main instructor at the Ali Akbar College of Music. He lives and teaches in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Joanna Mack began her pursuit of Classical North Indian Music in 1997. While studying neuroscience at UCSD, she took a Classical Indian Music class with sitar virtuoso Kartik Seshadri, a senior disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar. Recognizing Joanna’s inherent talent and drive, Kartikji recommended her to study in Kolkata under the late Pandit Deepak Choudhury, another disciple of Shankar. The day after Mother Theresa left this world, Joanna arrived in Calcutta, India, where she fully devoted herself to the pursuit of Indian classical music under the guidance of Deepakji. She continued her studies with him in Kolkata for eight years, finally returning to the U.S. in 2005 with her guru’s blessing. Upon departing India, Joanna promised that her dedication to learn would not falter and that she would accept the responsibility to teach the traditional values and ideas of the Maihar Gharana. Joanna now lives in San Francisco where she teaches private and group classes and performs regularly in a variety of venues.
The young and talented Amit Kavthekar (“GANDA-BANDH SHAGIRD” of Late Ustad Allarakha) has rhythm running through his veins. By the young age of six, he was already being groomed in the art of the tabla by Maestro Ustad Allarakha. Beginning in 1991, he was fortunate enough to be taught the intricacies of the table by Ustad Zakir Hussain, a master table maestro with an unbelievable number of fans worldwide. Amit currently teaches tabla at the American School of Bombay (ASB) and the New England School of Music. He is also a professor at Salem State University for the World Music Ensemble.
Mark Whitwell’s lineage of yoga stems from the teachings of Professor T. Krishnamacharya (Dzthe teacher of the teachersdz), and his son TKV Desikachar. Mark studied under these masters for more than twenty years, primarily in India. He is the editor and a contributor to TKV Desikachar’s book, The Heart of Yoga,as well as the author of Yoga of Heart and Hridayasutra. Mark’s passionate teachings clarify the profound relevance of ancient wisdom to contemporary life. He is also the founder of The Heart of Yoga Peace Project, a non-profit organization launched in 1996 that provides yoga education around the world, particularly in areas of conflict, where these simple healing principles and proven techniques are desperately needed the most.