Guru Ganesha: The Ageless Art of Kirtan
An Interview with Guru Ganesha: The Ageless Art of Kirtan
Interview by Liane Buck
Guru Ganesha Singh is World devotional music pioneer, Spirit Voyage Records founder, distinctive guitar stylist, songwriter, singer, producer, entrepreneur, accomplished yogi and lifelong spiritual practitioner, Guru Ganesha Singh is a man of many talents. His most recent project is the GuruGanesha Band, an adventurous ensemble of mantra music all-stars born of Guru Ganesha’s longstanding wish to combine the profound spirituality of mantra music with the visceral excitement of a great guitar-driven band.
We’re speaking with Guru Ganesha, which is a world-renowned devotional music pioneer, a source of continuous inspiration in all sorts of fields for the conscious community. Guru Ganesha is a rare breed of human being made of a rare clay. His immense contribution to the yoga community and the conscious music is immeasurable. I have the pleasure to interview him. Guru Ganesha, welcome to OMTimes interview.
Guru Ganesha: Thank you so much, Liane. It’s such an honor to be part of this. And I love what you’re doing with your magazine. You are dedicating your life to uplifting others. And I think that’s exactly what we’re on the Earth here to do, is to touch people, uplift people, I believe it’s God’s will to uplift everybody.
Liane Buck: I know the art of Kirtan that you’re performing nowadays is an essential art. The devotional singing and everything else. My big question for you would be how this happened in your life, how this came to be?
Guru Ganesha: Well, it’s interesting, because, I feel like everything is a gift. And when I was a young man of eight years old, there was a very famous television program called the Ed Sullivan Show. It was on Sunday night at 8:00, and the family would gather around the small black and white TV. And that’s the show that when the Beatles came to America, they were featured on that show. Well, my cousin was the studio guitar player in the Ed Sullivan band. Every now and then, the camera would show the band, and my father would get excited and say, “That’s your cousin, Hy White.” As a boy of eight, we went to visit him in New York. He brought us down to the basement and he had all these beautiful guitars hanging on hooks in his basement. I mean, must have been 35, 40 guitars hanging around his basement. And he saw the look on my face. I’m a boy of eight years old, and my jaw dropped and my eyes were popping out.
And he looked at me and he said, “Pick one out.” And I went around and I saw this beautiful Gibson semi-hollow body guitar, and I pointed at that. And he said, “You would pick my most beautiful, expensive guitar.” And he pulled it off the wall and handed it to me. And he said, “It’s yours. Now learn how to play it.” And that’s how it all got started.
And my mother on the way home, said, “Well, now that your cousin Hy White has given you this beautiful guitar, you have to learn, you have to study.” She got me a guitar teacher, a gentleman who had just come moved to USA from Italy, and he was an outstanding guitar player. And so, the next three and a half years I had a lesson every week and I learned how to play the guitar.
And then, the funny thing is, I also loved baseball. And my mother and I used to have kind of an ongoing argument ‘because she wanted me to practice my guitar and I wanted to go play baseball. But, then about a year later the Beatles came to America and were on the Ed Sullivan Show. And I heard them and I was just in the bliss when I heard their music. I thought it was beautiful. I realized, “Oh, my God, I have a guitar and I know how to play it.” So, the Beatles inspired me to take it out of the closet. I started my first band in high school called the Top Hats. And we played popular music because my parents were both in show business. My father was a singer and a dancer and a comedian. My mother was a singer and a dancer, so our house was filled with music. On the weekends, the house was filled with people from the entertainment industry would come and there would always be music and laughing and lots of joy. So, you know, just being surrounded by all that joy and all that music was such a wonderful influence on me. I went to College, and in college, I had a rock and roll band called Cat’s Cradle that actually did very well. And we got a recording contract when I was 20 with was a very reputable record label in New York City. And we went to New York three times to record.
