Back in the ashram, once a year, we had “Fun Day,” a day dedicated to, well, fun. We slept in late, ate ice cream, did a lot of group adventures during the day and had an evening of skits and songs.
Back when rap was just coming out, it was violent and rough. I decided to try my hand at a dharmic rap song and with my friend and colleague, Mark Kelso aka Hansaraj on synthesizer, we did it for about 350 residents, complete with a dance interlude.
I did it one more time in public, at Mark’s wedding with Todd Norian on keyboards and Time Brenner on drums. With professional back up, it was almost passable.
Almost.
At the retreat, I had no backup, so I slapped together a little rhythm loop on my iPad. Pretty rough, but pretty funny.
Imagine, during the chorus, Tara Brach, Hugh Byrne, Pat Coffey and Ruth King leaping out of their meditation seats to chant and pose.
This is great!! Love it!! I love HipHop but admittedly there are more negative rap songs than positive out there. They have Socially Conscious Rap and Christian Rap, why not Buddhist Rap or Dharma Rap? Lol For real though, I would love to see such a genre/movement! Very creative and y’all sound great too! Made me laugh as well
Thanks for sharing! Namasté
Lisa
Oh my goodness! This was a most pleasant and hilarious surprise this morning when I clicked play on the “I am Child of Light..” title from your podcast. I found myself jamming to the chorus in my head during work today. How great! Hope you take this on tour. Maybe at the Monday night class (hint hint
. Thanks for bringing more joy to my day!