Published on Jan 19, 1998
It’s amazing what can happen when you open up your mind to new
ideas.
I, for one, am not a particular fan of world music – don’t know
why, just never developed a taste for it. Then, what should arrive
in the mail but – ta-da!!! – a disc of music from Nepal from a
group I had never heard of. But something kept pulling me towards
this disc, and within two hours of going to the post office I had
the disc in my CD player.
Who knew that the strains of flute, tabla and sitar could be so
therapeutic? Who knew that Sur Sudha, a three-man group, could
bypass cultural boundaries to create a language that all could
understand? Who knew that
Images Of Nepal, the first of a promised three-disc set,
would be so addictive? Who knew, indeed.
At first glance, the trio of Prem Rana Autari, Bijada Vaidya and
Surendra Shrestha don’t seem like they’re the kind of group to
re-invent your thoughts about music. But they’ve spent the better
part of a decade taking the culture of Nepal, their homeland,
around the world as cultural ambassadors for Nepal. They’re coming
into a scene which, thanks to films like
Seven Days In Tibet and the recently-released
Kundun, is curious about this area of the world.
From the first strains of Vaidya’s sitar on “Raja Mati,” Sur
Sudha almost immediately takes hold of your spirit and eases it.
When I first listened to this disc, I was having an atrocious day
at the office, but as the sitar interwove with Autari’s flute and
Shrestha’s tabla work, I found myself regaining my temper and
focus. It sounds weird, even possibly stereotypical of this type of
music, but it
does tend to relax you. (And if you’re a hard-rockin’ person
who doesn’t think they’d be even remotely interested in this, dust
off the first album by Led Zeppelin and listen to “Black Mountain
Side.” Or listen to any of George Harrison’s experiments with the
Beatles. ‘Nuff said.)
Maybe without the liner notes you wouldn’t know that “Raja Mati”
and “Resham Firri” are love songs, or that “Nayaki Kanghada” is an
exercise in scales. But Sur Sudha creates a powerful groove with
their instruments that appeals to the mind as well as the ear that
you won’t feel cheated if you don’t know the story behind the
music. Oh, sure, all the songs are in a variation of the key of D,
but each song has such a unique feel that you might not notice it
on the first listen.
The biggest obstacle Sur Sudha will have to face, obviously, is
a market raised on rock and roll, unwilling to take a chance on
something radically different. Well, as someone who originally
didn’t want to listen to
Images Of Nepal, let me challenge you to give it a try. The
dedication and musicianship these three men emote make a
fifteen-minute song seem like only seconds, and may even develop a
taste in exploring world music within you.
If
Images Of Nepal can win over an old curmudgeon like me, then
you’ll love it as well.