Nirmala Rajasekar, veena, and Michelle Kinney, cello
Carnatic Veena Gallery—See this gallery to get a sense of the veena, the instrument that Nirmala Rajasekar plays. Also on that website are various songs.
Michelle Kinney—Cello
Nirmala Rajasekar—Carnatic Veena, vocals
Tanjavur K. Murugaboopathi—Mridangam (Indian hand drum)
Graham O'Brien—Drum Set
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Tanjavur K. Murugaboopathi—Mridangam (Indian hand drum)
Graham O'Brien—Drum Set
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Never have I witnessed a musician exude more evident joy while practicing her art than Nirmala Rajasekar. The Carnatic veena player seems almost ecstatic while playing, but in a sociable way, as she smiles broad and big, looking back and forth between her fellow players, catching their eyes, taking in their swaying moods, and swaying her own torso in a fluid dance.
Michelle Kinney, the co-leader of this session, may receive as much joy from playing, I don't know. She seems to be a more reserved person, who returns Rajasekar's extroversion with a quiet, dignified smile of her own. At a recent concert, Rajasekar mentioned how comfortable she felt playing with Kinney.
My sense is that all these players feel comfortable together. Mridangam player Murgaboopathi integrates his pounding and tapping into the often heavy brush sounds of Graham O'Brien's trap set. Graham's rhythms frequently struck me as Celtic and Irish.
And this is the point. The album is the fusing of Irish (Kinney) and Indian (Rajasekar) musics. Of the four instruments, O'Brien's use of the trap set seems the most Irish to me, with its rhythms often rooted in a kind of Celtic march. The veena and mridangam, a type of Indian hand drum, are the most decidedly Indian. Kinney swings back and forth with her cello, sometimes playing fat and Irish, sometimes skittering in ragas right along with the fleet-fingered Rajasekar.
The first song, "Pentatonic," goes on for 16 glorious minutes, fluidly spinning out and back, throwing tangents, coming back and turning around then back, and always—after a gentle first two minutes—momentum. The veena in the lead, then the cello, then, late in the song, a percussion duet.
Trancelike, shifting, moods turning and twisting—especially given the tremendous emotional range of Kinney on cello—"raga" means 'the act of colouring or dyeing'—in the case of music: heart, head, mood.
After two short pieces comes, "Boopathi and Graham," an eight-minute percussion dialogue. Interlacing, interlocking, then bumping, bouncing, sometimes even blasting. They move inside and then outside the other's frame, dancing, twisting, one first in the lead, then the other—but consistent forward momentum.
The final song, "That's No Way to Say Goodbye," is a reworking of Leonard Cohen's "Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye." Kinney takes the lead and plays large and dark. Attending to the title: are we hearing the hurt and anger left in the wake of a person leaving another in a rude, unfeeling fashion?
While we're on the subject of titles, why "Namaste" as title of the album? "Namaste," literally, in Sanskrit means "I bow to you." This album is, in some ways, to me, about respect—respect of musicians for audience, of musicians for each other, of artists to their art. It is about the improvised making of respect through attention to response, to others, to others responding, to a rhythmic flow and switch, to melodic runs and rills.
It enacts a gentle awareness of our social selves.
___________________
This album is available for purchase only from Kinney and Rajasekar. They asked me to post their emails. Contact them if interested:
>nirmalajrajasekar (at) gmail.com
>michellekinney (at) comcast.net
Michelle Kinney
Nirmala Rajasekar
Tanjavur K. Murugaboopathi
Graham O'Brien
The first song, "Pentatonic," goes on for 16 glorious minutes, fluidly spinning out and back, throwing tangents, coming back and turning around then back, and always—after a gentle first two minutes—momentum. The veena in the lead, then the cello, then, late in the song, a percussion duet.
Trancelike, shifting, moods turning and twisting—especially given the tremendous emotional range of Kinney on cello—"raga" means 'the act of colouring or dyeing'—in the case of music: heart, head, mood.
After two short pieces comes, "Boopathi and Graham," an eight-minute percussion dialogue. Interlacing, interlocking, then bumping, bouncing, sometimes even blasting. They move inside and then outside the other's frame, dancing, twisting, one first in the lead, then the other—but consistent forward momentum.
The final song, "That's No Way to Say Goodbye," is a reworking of Leonard Cohen's "Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye." Kinney takes the lead and plays large and dark. Attending to the title: are we hearing the hurt and anger left in the wake of a person leaving another in a rude, unfeeling fashion?
While we're on the subject of titles, why "Namaste" as title of the album? "Namaste," literally, in Sanskrit means "I bow to you." This album is, in some ways, to me, about respect—respect of musicians for audience, of musicians for each other, of artists to their art. It is about the improvised making of respect through attention to response, to others, to others responding, to a rhythmic flow and switch, to melodic runs and rills.
It enacts a gentle awareness of our social selves.
___________________
This album is available for purchase only from Kinney and Rajasekar. They asked me to post their emails. Contact them if interested:
>nirmalajrajasekar (at) gmail.com
>michellekinney (at) comcast.net
Michelle Kinney
Nirmala Rajasekar
Tanjavur K. Murugaboopathi
Graham O'Brien
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