CROWD MUSIC
It has got a lot to do with the sounds of of my hometown, where tens and sometimes hundreds of people sing in various occasions the same prayer, but each one slightly different. The end result is a vibrating intense sonic cloud which grows around you  (in music it is called Heterophony).


Opposite to the western concept of choir, which is build on hierarchy, “clean”
musical performance based on accuracy and on an a priori musical knowledge, the voices of the crowd in REKA should be various and individualistic, becoming through unity an environment, a texture which covers, uncovers and indicates a sonic ambient in which the events are born.

 Working with  LAMA SAMTEN YESHE RINPOCHE on the 5 elements Mudra - the challange is to adapt it to time, score and conductor's indications.

Cannot wait til he will sing it with the crowd - will be fantastic !!!

I am literately working day & night on the crowd part of REKA....In one week I'm done ! please stay tuned for online tutorials, downlodable score and much fun !!!

The mantras, mandalas, chants, prayers, rituals of cleaning the the karma, breathing meditations are anchored in the voice. The human voice is a vessel in which the Bön priests are putting verbal and non verbal metaphysic meanings of their beliefs regarding the essential functions  of their reality.

It is interesting to reflect about the use of vocals in the Bön culture and in Buddhism in general, in comparison to the musical use of "Amen" in the European Cristian liturgy - while both carry a function of a meditative word rather than an informative word (even though that in Hebew the word "Amen" carry many meanings deriving from its root A.M.A.N - which could hint art, practice, faith, artist) the Catholic tradition use its AMEN either as a closing pattern (all musical parameters go down) or as a rich base of musical movement and decoration (Melisma in musical terms), the vocals demostrated by Lama Samten are a rapresentation of the constant, the invariable, the eternal. This opposing difference - or complimentary relations if you wish - makes me think of the great debate between Heraclitus of Ephesus and Parmenides of Elea: 

Working with a LAMA
Lama Samten Yeshe Rinpoche is around my age. He was born in a small village in Tibet and from the age of 8 had entered the Bön Buddhism as a monk. he studied with great masters, and also had been the music Master of 400 priests in a temple. He hold a Doctor in philosophy degree and is teacher of the sacred masks dance of the Bön tradition. Now he is based in Paris and travels all around Europe to teach meditation and philosophy. I meet Lama Smten in the apartment of Judith, his assistant and a new dear friend of mine. In 2 minutes we become friends. He tell me that he will donate his payment for the concerts to his order and that the project has a lot in common with the Bön belief of peace, dialogue and compassion between men beings. It is important for him to explain me his motivation for the project, since some of the things I ask him to do are very sacred and also sometimes secret within the Bön culture.