Ganga – River of Love
special guest: Ustad Sultan Khan,
Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda
2001
Playing time 54 min
Ganga – River of Love
After two years of creative work in the seclusion of the Portuguese mountains Felix Maria Woschek and his friends are presenting their new work. The musicians´ joy and inspiration resulted in 2 CDs: „Ganga – River of Love“ and „Jamuna – River of Joy“.
Although containing well-known elements of F.M. Woschek´s characteristic style the 11th creation is offering new experiences to the listener. Touching spirituals are emerging from a unique fusion of Indian mantras and black soul music.
With his independent and sophisticated style F.M. Woschek is reaching a continuously increasing number of friends, amongst them well-known musicians. Thus you find, next to his own beautiful voice, not only the Indian Master of Sarangi and Chant, Ustad Sultan Khan, but also the enlightened singer and pianist Alice Coltrane Turyasangitananda, wife of legendary John Coltrane, as well as the black singer and pianist Panduranga Henderson, who toured around the world for twelve years with soul personified, Ray Charles, the Indian singer Sandya Sanjana, who devotedly combines all the facets of Indian chant and jazz and blues elements and, finally, Harida Quinteros, percussionist and santoorplayer from Chile. F.M. Woschek masterly succeeds in uniting all those brilliant musicians in his harmonious, deep and devoted music.
Such as the holy Indian rivers Ganga and Jamuna unite before becoming one with the boundless ocean, this music combines Orient and Occident, the Archaic and the Contemporary, thus merging into a touching, harmonious chant of love. The union of the holy rivers stands also for the union of the principles Shakti (Woman) and Shiva (Man) in cosmic, tantric love, in this music represented by the longing voices of women and men.
The sensitive listener feels the magic of this music and its profoundly healing effect on body, spirit and soul. One of the songs goes like that: “ Love is bliss, love is light, love is strength, love is God…. love should fill the whole world. Chanting the holy names of God helps us to open our hearts, so that our soul will reflect the divine light. “
Those who are full of yearning in this remarkable time will find beauty and powerful help in “ Ganga “ and “ Jamuna „.
Musicians
Ustad Sultan Khan – sarangi, vocals
Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda – lead vocals & organ on „OM Shanti“
Felix Maria Woschek – vocals, e-guitar, keyboards, percussion, bass
Sandhya Sanjana – vocals
Panduranga Henderson – vocals, keyboards
Harida Quinteros – drumset, udu-pot, tabla, percussion
Total time 54 min.
Reviews
„So Ham Sai Love“: „What the listener actually experiences is a deep, releasing spirituality“. This is what opens my spiritual eye when listening: The imagined bounds are becoming transparent, are dispersing.
Plain and simple
Already one of his earlier works, „Gospodi“, dedicated to Jesus Christ, accompanied me through many nights. Now, there is „Ganga“: also infinitely calm, expanding songs, carried by flowing guitar play, sarangi, some synthesizer, drums and meditatively performed bhajans, never slipping into the kitschy-sweet but remaining plain and simple. The longest piece, „OM Mata“ is sung to honour Haidakhan. Due to the conflict about Kashmir that is flaring up once again between Pakistan and India, „Rama Rama“ has become more relevant than ever before, because God is called on as Allah as well as Rama.
Conclusion
You will find a lot of esoteric CDs on the market, only few, however, are truly spiritual works, and „Ganga“ belonging to the latter category. For further information, please visit www.woschek.com
Inga Veit
GERMAN YOGA-FORUM 1/2002