Caboolture Sacred Music Festival

Sunday 22nd May saw a bunch of us EthnoSuperLoungers in the van together up to Caboolture for their Sacred Music Festival. Feridun Avar, Tenzin Choegyal and I performed at the same event last year, and this year we were joined by the beautiful Yuki Taniguchi. All the performances were 15-20 minutes each and at the end we had an impromptu jam session in which Tenzin, Feridun and I were joined by didjeridu player Lyndon Davis. Many thanks to Nooreen Harris and the Moreton Bay Regional Council for inviting us.

Lyndon Davies welcomed us to country and shared some didj sounds with us.

Hello Africa got things pumping.

Tas Savusa and girls

Feridun Avar with Shen on tabla

Yuki and Shen performing mantras and kirtans

Tenzin and Shen doing their Tibet 2 thing

A very fun jam session!

The musicians who were able to stay until the end

Ramakrishna Vedanta Centre Fundraiser

On 14th May I was invited to give tabla accompaniment in two performances at the 7th annual Ramakrishna Vedanta Centre Fundraiser. It was a lovely evening and very well organised, with a number of excellent South Indian student performances including the vocal students of Vijaya Visvanathan. The final item was a sitar recital by Dr Indranil Chatterjee - raga mala in keherva taal. This was my first opportunity to even hear Dr Chatterjee's sitar, and I was very surprised how lovely he played. Unfortunately for us music lovers he is too busy as a medical doctor to give many performances! I look forward to the next chance to play with him.

Students of Vijaya Visvanathan (accompanied on tabla by Shen)

Dr Indranil Chatterjee (sitar), accompanied by Shen (tabla)

Sugata Marjit

On 7th May I had the opportunity to take part in the Bengali Society of Queensland's celebrations of Rabindranath Tagore's 150th "birthday". The concert opened with performances by Namita Debroy and her Kathak dance school, and concluded with a vocal performance by visiting artist Prof Sugata Marjit, whom I accompanied on tabla. Sugata-ji has a most magnificent voice and it was a very enjoyable performance of khayals in teentaal and ektaal.