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Bio: Geoffrey Gordon was born in New York City. He began playing drum set and singing in rock bands at the age of fourteen. He played bass fiddle at the age of ten continuing in orchestra throughout College at New Paltz University. From 1971-1974 Geoffrey played drums in several popular rock bands in... more
Bio: Geoffrey Gordon was born in New York City. He began playing drum set and singing in rock bands at the age of fourteen. He played bass fiddle at the age of ten continuing in orchestra throughout College at New Paltz University. From 1971-1974 Geoffrey played drums in several popular rock bands in Woodstock and Ithaca NY. He attended Ulster College and was introduced to Joseph Campbell, Buckminster Fuller and Stanislav Grof as well as the teachings of Carl Jung and Shamanism by his Psychology Professor Stephen Larsen. Geoffrey met Ram Dass in 1971 and he learned yoga practices in Ananda Marga from 1971-1973. He attended the fist sessions at Naropa University in 1974. He became a tabla student of the great Ustad Allarakha in 1975 (Ravi Shankar's premier tabla player). He also studied tabla with Ustad Zakir Hussain and North Indian Classical Music with Ustad Ali Akbar Khan.
Geoffrey has performed on major motion picture soundtracks, on many popular recordings, at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, The Hollywood Bowl, on the Broadway stage in Tony Award winning shows, and in clubs and festivals throughout the world. Geoffrey taught on the faculties of Sarah Lawrence College, City College of NY, Omega, Esalen, and Hollyhock. Geoffrey also leads devotional chanting known as kirtan and accompanies many devotional singers.
Geoffrey has produced CDs for Rita Coolidge and Walela, Shiva Rea, Swami Vishwananda, Diana Rogers, The Hanuman Foundation, and Marie Elizabeth. Geoffrey was the percussionist for Jai Uttal and The Pagan Love Orchestra on all tours and recordings including the Grammy nominated 'Mondo Rama'. He's recorded with Robbie Robertson, Walela, David Torn, Kenny Loggins, Ram Dass, Jai Uttal, Krishna Das, R. Carlos Nakai & Nawang Khechog, Peter Kater, Steven Halpern, Gabrielle Roth, Tulku, Little Wolf, Stephen Kent, Coleman Barks and many others. He has performed on stage with many great musicians including Dave Liebman, Don Cherry, Reggie Workman, Rashied Ali, Badal Roy, Don Byron, Simone Shahine, Peter Apfelbaum, Kit walker, Steve Gorn, and many others. Geoffrey's percussion is heard on movie soundtracks with composers Carter Burwell (composer- 'No Country for Old Men') and Academy Award winner Elliot Goldenthal (composer- 'Frida, Batman Forever').
Geoffrey's original music for 'Inanna' with Diane Wolkstein was performed at The United Nations, Avery Fisher Hall and the British Museum in London. Geoffrey's compositions for Diane include versions of the ancient sacred stories of Sumeria, Mayan, Chinese, Biblical, Native American and Inuit traditions. They also performed at the Asia Society, the Jung Foundation, the American Museum of Natural History, and The Jewish Theological Seminary.
Geoffrey worked on and off Broadway and at Lincoln Center with director Julie Taymor ('Across the Universe', 'Frida', 'The Lion King') and composer Elliot Goldenthal in 'Juan Darien'. Geoffrey also performed on Broadway in the Tony Award winning play 'M. Butterfly' with the original cast starring John Lithgow and BD Wong. He performed with Robbie Robertson and with Rita Coolidge and Walela at the First Native American Music Awards. He was featured in "Rumi: Poet of the Heart" on PBS with Coleman Barks. Geoffrey performed with Walela at The New Orleans Jazz Festival and the Great American Music Hall. He was a featured soloist with the Tibetan Singing Bowl Ensemble at the Atomic Bomb Commemoration Ceremonies in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. Geoffrey performed in the Knitting Factory Soundtrack Festival with movie composer Carter Burwell performing Carter's compositions from FARGO, ROB ROY, GODS AND MONSTERS, KALIFORNIA, and RAISING ARIZONA. He played for Gabrielle Roth for many years at Esalen Institute and at retreats and conferences. Geoffrey has also performed with Jason Hwang, Stephen Kent, Jaya Lakshmi, Lucia Hwong, Lex Hixon, The Ali Akbar Khan Orchestra and many others.
Geoffrey played concerts, taught workshops and accompanied kirtans with Jai Uttal at venues including: The Prophet's Conferences in Maui, Victoria Island and Monterey, Joseph Papp's Public Theater, Jiva Mukti, Omega Institute, Esalen, Spirit Rock, CIIS, Breitenbush, Figi, Kalani Hawaii, Yoga Journal Conferences, Southwest Yoga Conference, Holotropic Breathwork/Chanting Retreats, Transpersonal Psychology Conferences in Manous Brazil, Palm Springs and Santa Clara, LA's Sacred Music Festivals, The Shantipi Festival in Israel, Santa Fe Jazz Festival, San Diego Jazz Festival, Yoga Works, Monterey World Music Festival, Seattle's Bumbershoot Festivals, The House of Blues, The Montreux Jazz Festival, Health and Harmony Festival, Earth Dance, Trinity Tribal Stomp, The Hog Farm's Annual Pignick, ABC Television's LIVE IN CONCERT, BET Jazz Cable TV, with Goldie Hawn and Robbin Williams for Operation Smile, and opening for Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan at the Universal Ampitheater in LA and the Greek Theater in Berkeley.
Geoffrey taught music composition on the dance faculty of Sarah Lawrence College 1985-90. Geoffrey was Composer in Residence and musical director for the Dance Dept at City College of New York in Harlem 1980-1990 composing and performing with dancers and teachers from Alvin Ailey, Dance Theater of Harlem, Martha Graham, Paul Taylor, Merce Cunningham, Tamar Rogoff, Lavinia Williams.
Geoffrey Gordon
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YM: So, you are not new to the music industry, where did you get your start?
GG: I started playing music professionally in upstate New York from 1970 – 72 where I played drum set in rock bands in and around Woodstock, NY. From 1973 - 74 I played drums in a band in Ithaca, NY with a great guitarist named David Torn who went on to play with David Bowie, Jeff Beck and many others. We played a lot at Cornell University, Ithaca College and in local clubs. I moved to New York City in 1975 to be with the Neem Karoli Baba satsang. Ram Das, Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, Bhagavan Das and many other Neem Karoli Baba devotees had moved to NYC to gather together. We all lived in a group of houses mostly in Queens, NY and gathered together almost every day. We did a lot of kirtan. That was an amazing time. Around the same time I started getting a lot of work playing music in New York because I was a drum set player who also studied tabla, frame drum, congas and could read music. There were very few of us in the 70’s. Steve Gorn, Badal Roy (who played with Miles David) and I opened for David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir in 1975. I recorded with Jai Uttal in 1975 on an album called ‘Crystal Tears’. While studying tabla with Ustad Allarakha that same year, Bhagavan Das and I did a public kirtan together at a church in Washington DC. There was quite a big turnout for that time. It was a rare early American kirtan outside of the Indian community with a cover charge. The money was stolen that night which we saw as Maharaji’s grace. I was honored to play tabla with Visant Rai and Stephen Kindler in 1976 at The Bottom Line and The New School in New York City. Visant Rai was a student along with Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan of the great music guru Ustad Allauddin Khansahib. Steve Kindler had recorded and toured with John McLaughlin and Jeff Beck. My first big recording came in 1984. It was a duo improvisation album for ECM Records recorded in Norway with David Torn called ‘Best Laid Plans’. That was my first international release on a major label as a drummer/percussionist. It was highly spirited music and well received by music critics and new jazz people. We put tabla on one track, which was pretty new at that time. The rest was hard driving drums and electric guitar. David Torn now works in LA as a film composer (‘Lars and the Real Girl’, ‘The Wackness’). My first Hollywood film score session was in 1987 playing on ‘Raising Arizona’ by the Cohen Brothers and my first Broadway show was ‘M. Butterfly’ in 1988 with John Lithgow.
YM: You have played a lot of different styles of music, when did you know that it was time for Kirtan?
GG: When the 1990’s rolled around, some spiritually oriented, east/west trained musicians I’d been playing with since the early 70’s started wondering if we could do kirtan in public. The idea of merging spiritual practice with economic livelihood was challenging. Merging ancient sacred eastern music traditions and modern western music was still very new. Kirtan wasn’t exactly performing arts. It was a spiritual practice from India to be presented as a public event to Americans. In 1992 I moved from New York City to The Bay Area to play and record with Jai Uttal and The Pagan Love Orchestra. Jai and I were old friends so we would naturally do kirtan together outside of the band in our private lives. Then, very slowly we started doing kirtans at yoga centers locally while we were doing concerts and touring with the Pagan Love Orchestra. The kirtans were a sideline to the band at first. We didn’t think kirtan was going to attract a large amount of people. Gradually we started doing kirtan at Omega, CIIS, Esalen, Breitenbush, yoga conferences and yoga centers around the US and overseas. There started to be more kirtans than dates with the band. Jai and I worked with Ram Dass and recorded ‘Chord of Love’ in 1993 and we helped put together Krishna Das’ first cd ‘One Track Heart’ in 1996. Then Krishna Das started touring and recording more. Yoga started to hit pop culture through Sting, Madonna and others. Kirtan started to take off and by the turn of the millennium it was a sub-genre in the recording industry.
YM: What is Kirtan to you?
GG: Kirtan is a practice for self realization and enlightenment. It’s a way to gather with others to help create a more compassionate, conscious world. It’s a way to uplift society in general. Kirtan works with the collective unconscious realms we all have inside. There is a trance healing aspect to it. The repetition of mantra while singing creates a certain pranayama effect. That along with having the rhythm of the music start slowly and get gradually faster is a healing technique used in many shaman cultures around the world. A kindness and wisdom gets passed from the ancient ones when we all sing together and ideate on our oneness with all beings, praying for healing and relieving suffering. Kirtan is archetypal music. It opens pure awareness inside of us. It is meditation in action. The name of God or Nama Mantra is a microcosm of the entire universe in one word. If said or sung with the right ideation even once it can help relieve tremendous suffering.
YM: Please tell us about your yoga and meditation practice.
GG: I walk, play music and meditate each day. I stretch and do simple asanas. I do versions of shoulder stand, fish, cobra, and head to knee poses that are appropriate to injuries I’ve gotten over the years (mostly from drumming the wrong way). I also do sun salutation. My meditation involves awareness of my breathing to help arrive in the present moment. I continue to inquire into the nature of who I am and what I am feeling and thinking as each moment passes. I offer everything to God, the universal, omnipresent, omnipotent, all pervading oneness through all things and all time. I ask to be of service.
YM: You have played with a lot of amazing people! How does it feel to have this be YOUR album?
GG: This is really a beautiful thing. I have been blessed to play on some great albums with many really wonderful musicians over the years. This album was a whole new thing. It was done in my own studio on my own time over several years between other projects. I had to wait quite a while to get this album out so this has been a real birthing for me. It’s really got my essence in it. I was able to play all these instruments I love on it like piano, guitar, bass and a bunch of different drums. I spent a long time mixing it. Some of the vocal tracks I recorded after I woke up in the middle of the night and they wound up being the best takes. This album is really intimate for me, very close to my skin and heart. I’m about to finish several new albums: a world music cd with Sukhawat Ali Khan, Stephen Kent and myself called Baraka Moon and a kirtan cd with a wonderful singer named Uma Reed.
YM: What is your favorite part of working in this industry?
GG: Helping to make people happy. Keeping faith in the altruistic parts of life when it looks the darkest. Inspiring people to really care for each other. Helping people dance and feel less burdened by life. I love the feeling of uplifting humanity that’s inherent in music and especially in kirtan.
YM: Why do music and spirituality blend so beautifully?
GG: Music is spirit. It is the Divine Mother’s living body incarnate. How we sing, play and listen to music is a pure reflection of the state of our consciousness in the moment. Music follows universal laws of physics and science that are the same through all cultures and all time. Like keeping a steady pulse, being in tune, etc. That combines with our emotional associations which reflect our cultural and ancestral influences. Music is not static. It is a painting using time as a canvas. It is a flexible invisible mirror of our soul. Melody, harmony, consonance, dissonance, and rhythm weave feelings and experiences in time which affect emotional associations in the brain. Music has no caste. It’s sounds are available equally to all. It is invisible yet so profound and important in our lives.
YM: What was the inspiration for this album?
GG: The inspiration is to help in any way to relieve suffering in the world. It is my personal vision of east west fusion both musically and spiritually. It came out of me most naturally as an offering of love.
YM: Who do you like to listen to?
GG: My tastes are extremely eclectic. Lately I’ve been listening to some old Miles Davis, some rare recordings of Yemenite Jewish music, Elliot Goldenthal’s score for the film ‘Frida’, Jeff Beck on that Crossroads Festival DVD, and The Hanuman Chaleesa cd I helped produce a few years back.
YM: What do you love?
GG: I love love! For me, that’s what bhakti yoga is. I love the hidden Bodhisattvas of this world. I love when we are inspired to dedicate our lives to uplifting all beings toward a truly awake, peaceful, creative and compassionate planet.
YM: Thank you for joining us and Congratulations on the new album! Where can we buy the CD and find out more about you?
GG: Thank you for inviting me.
‘Breath of Rama’ is now available from White Swan Music Distribution www.whiteswanmusic.com, iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody,
CD Baby www.cdbaby.com
http://innersong.com/
You can listen to samples of the songs on www.myspace.com/geoffreygordon.
It’s gradually getting into more stores and yoga centers. If you enjoy the music please ask your yoga centers, music and book stores to carry it.
My web site is www.geoffreygordon.com where people can see tour, concert, and kirtan schedules and get contact information. Namaste.
YM: So, you are not new to the music industry, where did you get your start?
GG: I started playing music professionally in upstate New York from 1970 – 72 where I played drum set in rock bands in and around Woodstock, NY. From 1973 - 74 I played drums in a band in Ithaca, NY with a great guitarist named David Torn who went on to play with David Bowie, Jeff Beck and many others. We played a lot at Cornell University, Ithaca College and in local clubs. I moved to New York City in 1975 to be with the Neem Karoli Baba satsang. Ram Das, Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, Bhagavan Das and many other Neem Karoli Baba devotees had moved to NYC to gather together. We all lived in a group of houses mostly in Queens, NY and gathered together almost every day. We did a lot of kirtan. That was an amazing time. Around the same time I started getting a lot of work playing music in New York because I was a drum set player who also studied tabla, frame drum, congas and could read music. There were very few of us in the 70’s. Steve Gorn, Badal Roy (who played with Miles David) and I opened for David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir in 1975. I recorded with Jai Uttal in 1975 on an album called ‘Crystal Tears’. While studying tabla with Ustad Allarakha that same year, Bhagavan Das and I did a public kirtan together at a church in Washington DC. There was quite a big turnout for that time. It was a rare early American kirtan outside of the Indian community with a cover charge. The money was stolen that night which we saw as Maharaji’s grace. I was honored to play tabla with Visant Rai and Stephen Kindler in 1976 at The Bottom Line and The New School in New York City. Visant Rai was a student along with Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan of the great music guru Ustad Allauddin Khansahib. Steve Kindler had recorded and toured with John McLaughlin and Jeff Beck. My first big recording came in 1984. It was a duo improvisation album for ECM Records recorded in Norway with David Torn called ‘Best Laid Plans’. That was my first international release on a major label as a drummer/percussionist. It was highly spirited music and well received by music critics and new jazz people. We put tabla on one track, which was pretty new at that time. The rest was hard driving drums and electric guitar. David Torn now works in LA as a film composer (‘Lars and the Real Girl’, ‘The Wackness’). My first Hollywood film score session was in 1987 playing on ‘Raising Arizona’ by the Cohen Brothers and my first Broadway show was ‘M. Butterfly’ in 1988 with John Lithgow.
YM: You have played a lot of different styles of music, when did you know that it was time for Kirtan?
GG: When the 1990’s rolled around, some spiritually oriented, east/west trained musicians I’d been playing with since the early 70’s started wondering if we could do kirtan in public. The idea of merging spiritual practice with economic livelihood was challenging. Merging ancient sacred eastern music traditions and modern western music was still very new. Kirtan wasn’t exactly performing arts. It was a spiritual practice from India to be presented as a public event to Americans. In 1992 I moved from New York City to The Bay Area to play and record with Jai Uttal and The Pagan Love Orchestra. Jai and I were old friends so we would naturally do kirtan together outside of the band in our private lives. Then, very slowly we started doing kirtans at yoga centers locally while we were doing concerts and touring with the Pagan Love Orchestra. The kirtans were a sideline to the band at first. We didn’t think kirtan was going to attract a large amount of people. Gradually we started doing kirtan at Omega, CIIS, Esalen, Breitenbush, yoga conferences and yoga centers around the US and overseas. There started to be more kirtans than dates with the band. Jai and I worked with Ram Dass and recorded ‘Chord of Love’ in 1993 and we helped put together Krishna Das’ first cd ‘One Track Heart’ in 1996. Then Krishna Das started touring and recording more. Yoga started to hit pop culture through Sting, Madonna and others. Kirtan started to take off and by the turn of the millennium it was a sub-genre in the recording industry.
YM: What is Kirtan to you?
GG: Kirtan is a practice for self realization and enlightenment. It’s a way to gather with others to help create a more compassionate, conscious world. It’s a way to uplift society in general. Kirtan works with the collective unconscious realms we all have inside. There is a trance healing aspect to it. The repetition of mantra while singing creates a certain pranayama effect. That along with having the rhythm of the music start slowly and get gradually faster is a healing technique used in many shaman cultures around the world. A kindness and wisdom gets passed from the ancient ones when we all sing together and ideate on our oneness with all beings, praying for healing and relieving suffering. Kirtan is archetypal music. It opens pure awareness inside of us. It is meditation in action. The name of God or Nama Mantra is a microcosm of the entire universe in one word. If said or sung with the right ideation even once it can help relieve tremendous suffering.
YM: Please tell us about your yoga and meditation practice.
GG: I walk, play music and meditate each day. I stretch and do simple asanas. I do versions of shoulder stand, fish, cobra, and head to knee poses that are appropriate to injuries I’ve gotten over the years (mostly from drumming the wrong way). I also do sun salutation. My meditation involves awareness of my breathing to help arrive in the present moment. I continue to inquire into the nature of who I am and what I am feeling and thinking as each moment passes. I offer everything to God, the universal, omnipresent, omnipotent, all pervading oneness through all things and all time. I ask to be of service.
YM: You have played with a lot of amazing people! How does it feel to have this be YOUR album?
GG: This is really a beautiful thing. I have been blessed to play on some great albums with many really wonderful musicians over the years. This album was a whole new thing. It was done in my own studio on my own time over several years between other projects. I had to wait quite a while to get this album out so this has been a real birthing for me. It’s really got my essence in it. I was able to play all these instruments I love on it like piano, guitar, bass and a bunch of different drums. I spent a long time mixing it. Some of the vocal tracks I recorded after I woke up in the middle of the night and they wound up being the best takes. This album is really intimate for me, very close to my skin and heart. I’m about to finish several new albums: a world music cd with Sukhawat Ali Khan, Stephen Kent and myself called Baraka Moon and a kirtan cd with a wonderful singer named Uma Reed.
YM: What is your favorite part of working in this industry?
GG: Helping to make people happy. Keeping faith in the altruistic parts of life when it looks the darkest. Inspiring people to really care for each other. Helping people dance and feel less burdened by life. I love the feeling of uplifting humanity that’s inherent in music and especially in kirtan.
YM: Why do music and spirituality blend so beautifully?
GG: Music is spirit. It is the Divine Mother’s living body incarnate. How we sing, play and listen to music is a pure reflection of the state of our consciousness in the moment. Music follows universal laws of physics and science that are the same through all cultures and all time. Like keeping a steady pulse, being in tune, etc. That combines with our emotional associations which reflect our cultural and ancestral influences. Music is not static. It is a painting using time as a canvas. It is a flexible invisible mirror of our soul. Melody, harmony, consonance, dissonance, and rhythm weave feelings and experiences in time which affect emotional associations in the brain. Music has no caste. It’s sounds are available equally to all. It is invisible yet so profound and important in our lives.
YM: What was the inspiration for this album?
GG: The inspiration is to help in any way to relieve suffering in the world. It is my personal vision of east west fusion both musically and spiritually. It came out of me most naturally as an offering of love.
YM: Who do you like to listen to?
GG: My tastes are extremely eclectic. Lately I’ve been listening to some old Miles Davis, some rare recordings of Yemenite Jewish music, Elliot Goldenthal’s score for the film ‘Frida’, Jeff Beck on that Crossroads Festival DVD, and The Hanuman Chaleesa cd I helped produce a few years back.
YM: What do you love?
GG: I love love! For me, that’s what bhakti yoga is. I love the hidden Bodhisattvas of this world. I love when we are inspired to dedicate our lives to uplifting all beings toward a truly awake, peaceful, creative and compassionate planet.
YM: Thank you for joining us and Congratulations on the new album! Where can we buy the CD and find out more about you?
GG: Thank you for inviting me.
‘Breath of Rama’ is now available from White Swan Music Distribution www.whiteswanmusic.com, iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody,
CD Baby www.cdbaby.com
http://innersong.com/
You can listen to samples of the songs on www.myspace.com/geoffreygordon.
It’s gradually getting into more stores and yoga centers. If you enjoy the music please ask your yoga centers, music and book stores to carry it.
My web site is www.geoffreygordon.com where people can see tour, concert, and kirtan schedules and get contact information. Namaste.
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