Baroda and Back!

Hello Baroda!

Ba-by Shark doo doo, doo doo doo-doo!

The cast of characters on my journey to Baroda so far: Vinali, Shanth, Shiva, Bhumika, Gargesh, Ashish, Sanjiv, Auntie Aruna, Uncle Gopi, Shebhum the dedicated keyboardist, Thomas the romantic singer-songwriter, Schoen the provider of illicit booze, Sanderijn the Dutch sound guy, Ragou the loud benefactor, Ojusva the little bro, Rajinda(?) the transformational facilitator, Suwarchela the Principal-Ma'am, and Sasha the somewhat-dykey caterer (who made THE richest meal i've had in India, hands-down.... i've never had butter paneer like that, before or maybe henceforth! Damn, girl!)

Shanth and Shiva Swaroop are a pair of unexplainably charismatic brothers who live with their parents, Aruna the wonderful educator and Gopi the Astrologer Baba, in a homey apartment in the middle of Vadodara, the "Cultural Capital of Gujarat ("Baroda" to the homies), along with their good friend, the sweet and sincere Ashish, and the lovely and resourceful Gargesh, Shanth's "better half".... Shanth is a big bear of a guy in body and a tender soul in spirit, as well as a lover of all things guitar and dark-rock-style; he and i met on a train last year and bonded over guitar talk during the long train hours, forging a connection of the sort where we knew we'd be seeing each other again! His younger brother, Shiva, is the drummer of the family, and has been in the long and artistically arduous process of making a band happen for the last three years - with which i can relate! Shiva is intense and brooding, when he becomes distracted from the fun and interest life has to offer, and philosophic, curious, and wry when he's on his game.... i feel like i've met him somewhere before! One of those things.... Shanth and Shiva's family has been very welcoming and kind to me, letting me stay in their place in the air-conditioned room - along with Shanth, Arpita, and Shiva all sleeping on the floor next to me like refugees! i tried to protest, and at least give the couple the mattress, but they all vigorously declined.... What could i do but say thanks?

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A bleary 7 AM drag-myself-out-of-bed brought me, on the back of Vinali's scooter, to the week-long Education Workshop which she was attending, where she had secured me a special invitation as a fellow-educator.... Little did i understand that this was a Ladies' Empowerment Workshop, provided for educators to assist in the process of becoming better educators! And the bright sunlit morning found me seated in the circle sticking out like a sore thumb as the lone white male amongst 12-15 Indian females of varying ages; the workshop was conducted in english, mainly, yet several of the women spoke no english, and IT was clear to me as the all-day session went on, that the language was consistently being done for my convenience, and they had to translate important parts for the Hindi-speaking ladies, rather than just speaking in Hindi the whole time.... This made me very self-conscious and disturbed that i was creating a language-barrier in the room, purely unintentionally; i appreciated the kindness in their conducting the session so that i could understand IT, but certainly not at the expense of the comprehension of ladies who ACTUALLY WERE SUPPOSED to be there....! i quite enjoyed the content of NVC-style conscious communication and empathy being discussed, and chipped in as seemed appropriate throughout the morning and afternoon; but at the day's end, when invited to return the following day, i found myself mumbling some half-hearted semi-positive niceties, knowing that there would be no way i would be returning to the ladies' circle the next day, to which i had so kindly been invited....

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Oh, hanging out with Sanjiv and Bhumika is so spiritually invigorating! Everything is Maya, nothing exists, we do not exist; therefore, when we speak to each other, we don't really hear anything, and the person speaking to us isn't really there.... And neither are we! This makes for some very, very amusing interactions, speaking with Sanjiv who continually insists that he is not there....! :-D

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Thanks to Vinali and her "Sacred Business Program" conference call with some honky facilitator dude in the States, i had the opportunity tonight (in guided conference-call meditation) to meet my future self from twenty years down the line, somewhere out on a stone bench in a forest clearing.... Future Me was wearing a yellow-with-brown designs trippy shirt, and had graying beard and dreds shot through with gray hanging down my future back; we hung out together in silence very comfortably for a little bit, enjoying the paradoxical weirdness of the moment.... Finally, i asked myself the only question that i was interested in asking: "So.... Did we ever get IT all figured out?" And i responded, "Are you kidding me?" with a wry grin.... i chuckled and we ruminated on this for a minute, while the very white facilitator dude tinnily tapped on his shamanic drum, somewhere far away inside the phone.... i turned back over to continue the conversation with myself, JUST AS the self-styled shamanic sacred-business facilitator started whiningly chanting some sort of pseudo-native-American "hey-yuh-hi-yuh-hey-yuh-wah-wah", so loudly and gratingly that any further conversation proved impossible; we looked at each other sardonically, shaking our heads and smiling, as we both silently agreed that the facilitator dude was preventing the very interaction that he was supposed to be facilitating.... The image reminded us of two lovers in a gorgeous Italian restaurant, on a romantic date, and the guy is about to propose marriage to the girl, when an oblivious violin player saunters up to the table to play a romantic violin solo for the budding lovers, and plays so loud and long that IT becomes a tragicomedy, never leaving the table, and never opening his eyes to see the disgusted looks on the faces of the terminally-bored couple.... By the time our facilitator stopped giving IT his best ooga-ooga, he was meditatively-guiding us out of the forest, thanking our future selves for showing up and talking to us.... i and i threw each other a last humorous smile, and took our parting of ways....

*****

Here i sit, alone in the gardens of the Museum of Baroda, under the cooling shade of a tree in the hot afternoon sun, surrounded by pieces of India's archaeology standing on pedestals placed all through the garden's pathways.... Feeling blessed to be in India

Sir George Clausen, photorealistic British painter, mid-1850's? Beautiful style, look him up!

The flamboyantly gay prince of Gujarat! DammIT, i could have paid him 2000 rupees to hang out with me! And he would have shown up for dinner with an entourage and riding an elephant! ):-(

Nicholas Roerich, artist traveler and chronicler of eastern medicine and mysticism, look him up! Rec from Sanjiv

The Fun Park! Cotton candy and "popcron", The Breakdance, shooting balloons.... Fun for the whole fam!

*****

Gargesh, who manages the beautifully-styled RCA Music Academy, has kindly offered me the opportunity to conduct a guitar workshop for the RCA students as a guest instructor this week! i am honored, and excited to be able to share some education time with interested kids here in town! This will be my first instructional workshop class that i've ever held.... At the tender age of 37!

*My Musical Bio*

Nolan McFadden, from New York City, USA, has been playing guitar for 23 years, and singing all his life.... A veteran of the Antifolk scene in the East Village of NYC, and a jam-band and improvisational rock guitarist in Boulder and Denver, Colorado, Nolan has been traveling in Asia since 2011, playing for dancing people in China, India, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, and Singapore.... Nolan has played in such bands as IT, Unbroken Chain, Dirty Water, The Penthouse Sessions, The Left Channel, Strange New Worlds, Maps Of Malta, The Moment, Conscious Sleep, Heavy Meadow, and The Spicy Tacos; and in Thailand, The Wakefield-McFadden Acoustic Duo, and the authentic latin sound of Los Puentes (The Bridges)! He lists his main influences as the Sun and the Moon, and dreams of flying around the world in a hot-air balloon with nothing but his guitar and his Taro cards!

Here's links to some of Nolan's music online: www.myspace.com/themomentmusical
www.soundcloud.com/nolan-mcfadden
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8313g0NghQ (Los Puentes demo video)

Syllabus for my RCA Guitar Workshop:

1) Intro of self - Storytime!
2) Main components of musical direction: Covers/Songwriting/Improvisation....Examples!
3) Solo playing & Group music - Pros & Cons
4) Live examples of Solo vs. Group
5) Practice & Motivation - FUN and Make IT Fun! And - What Do You Want To Do?
6) Applying Practice to Performance - Integration!
7) Reading The Audience / Professional Listening
8) Being an Artist!
9) Q & A

So much for planning! The actual workshop was, uh, a bit different than i had expected; i had imagined a room with five to ten teenage kids, where i would have the chance to get to know the attendees a little bit, ask them some questions and let them ask me some as well during the course of the workshop.... Talk about my life, show them things on the guitar in which they might be interested.... However, the reality rearing ITs head was a lot of chairs set up in the big main lobby area at RCA, and eventually, a packed room of maybe thirty people, all of ages from six or seven up through older folks, and me at the front commanding the space from a chair behind my guitar! Both the guitar and my mic were being run through a PA, which had terrible sound for the guitar, and even Sanderijn the happy Dutch sound engineer could do nothing to save my sound.... The two-hour workshop was a minor nightmare for me, as the lecture-style format of the room's setup was not at all attuned to my naturally-interactive delivery style, and every time i tried to get people talking or ask questions, the room would be as silent as the grave - indicating that people either did not understand anything i was saying, or were completely unwilling to engage in a public forum.... Either way, there was basically two hours of me doing a loooot of talking, and some playing of the guitar and singing, mostly as an accompaniment to my ruminations on artistry and as examples of my songwriting; during which, people seemed to enjoy the music while IT lasted, and would then return to shockingly zombie-like states during my lengthy speeches which followed....

The clock ticked on, and on, as i spoke about practice habits, musicianship as a career, and the true intent of the artist in society to an audience that seemed so planted and silent that birds should have been nesting and pooping on some of them.... A couple of intrepid teenage kids finally asked me a couple of questions during my wistful "Q&A" section towards the end, which i answered a little too eagerly, as starved as i was for some sort of human interaction.... Finally, mercifully, the clocks hands slid into the proper position, and i thanked everyone for being such a patient audience and bid everyone adieu 'til next time, where i hope the setting will somehow be more conducive to real interaction.... Afterwards, amid the handshaking and hugs, i was assured by Arpita that people had really enjoyed the talk, and were just too shy to interact or speak up (also too shy to admit that they didn't fully understand my accent and my general speech).... i thanked her for her sweet little lies, and hoped that SOMEONE had gotten SOMETHING out of the ghastly two hours; i went to the bathroom and splashed some water on my face, trying to prepare myself for what i assumed would be the easy part coming up next, the hour of performance for whoever cared to stick around....

And somehow, the sound on the PA had become EVEN SHITTIER during the break, and as i dug in and gritted my way through my songs, Sanderijn turned knobs left and right and just kept shrugging in confusion and apology in the corner of my eye, as i heard my sound go from bad to worse and back up to bad again.... Sanderijn is a pro audio tech, and knows exactly what the hell he's doing, and so once again we see the value of spending the bucks on a really high-quality system; as your shit can look as impressive as you want, but if the internals are made out of gumballs and goo, your sound is going to be shit and even the pro's pro behind the board is going to have to go home with their head hanging down.... i played maybe five songs, and was regretting going on even that far, so i apologized to the audience for the terrible sound, played my current favorite "Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight" by James Taylor, and departed the floor.... Next time, world, next time....

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Ojusva! Good kid from Baroda, fights with his parents all the time, needs big bro - met at my Baroda workshop

Handwo - Gujarati masala cake

"Prepare your anus." - Shanth :-D

Observing a couple of guitar classes in progress at RCA to get a sense of how music school is done here in India, i noticed that if i were running the show, i would have to completely revamp how these classes were being run: five kids in a room, with acoustic guitars, all in various levels of playing skill and all playing different things, so the room spins with the cacaphony of musical asymmetry.... Meanwhile, the two teachers sit on the sidelines, silent and letting the kids just kind of do their things without so much as a suggestion here or there, for the most part! Sitting on the sidelines myself, i could not stop myself from telling one of the kids i liked what he was doing, and giving a couple of pointers; one girl was doing a scale over and over pretty well, and i chirped in to show her a different scale she could try.... The teachers amusedly watched me interacting with their students, smiling at each other as if i was the naive one in the room! i felt like i had fallen down some kind of educational rabbit-hole into La-La-Land.... Now i know how NOT to run my guitar classes, anyway....!

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Living a choiceless life! This and many other tidbits of Baba-wisdom were imparted to me during a full-on astrological reading from professional astrologer and life-coach Jayagopi (Uncle), Shanth & Shiva's dad, down at his little office in a busy section of Baroda town.... His astrological profile of me described me as romantic, easy-going, enjoying the support of friends; having a strong physique and good at games/sports; very creative with a lot of imagination; talented in music and fine-arts skills; having had met with a few vehicular accidents and suffered a few broken relationships; and that finding my life-partner will bring lady luck to life, where although i will meet with initial marital troubles, later all will be good.... Apparently, i need to take care until Jan. 16, 2014, as my major period running from Jan. of 1996 until this nearby time in my current life comes to an end, and i should preferably go back home (presumably to the States) ASAP, to take the most care, i guess.... i'm not going home anytime soon (not that i know of!), so i'll just have to take my chances out in the big bad world! Hey, at least now i have traveler's insurance! Thanks Mom & Dad! And thank you to Uncle for a brilliant and insightful session of life-advice, compassionately and kindly given from a gentleman who clearly wants the best peaceful lives for everyone on earth! Such an honor and a pleasure to be gifted a full helping of wisdom and kindness at one sitting! Much love and thanks :-)

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What i say to Facebook: "An amazing week in beautiful Baroda! Full of new meetings, new family, new friends, and opportunities to share experiences, Taro readings, Gujarati food, and love! Many thanks and unending gratitude to Shanth Swaroop, Shiva Swaroop, Vinali Doshi, Arpita Gargesh, Bhumika Patel, Sanjiv Valsan, Thomas Albert, Shubham Kamat, Sanderijn Wagenvoorde, RCA Music Academy, and the folks who made me feel like family as soon as i hit town.... Much love to everyone and i can't wait to return to Baroda! ;-)"

What i say in journalling: "All in all, i took a trip to Baroda this past week to visit friends, and am now back on the Paschim Express, returning to Delhi with a new family down in Vadodara, unexpected and warm and welcoming of my bizarre musical presence in their midst (thanks to Auntie Aruna and my new Baba Gopi); when you have the kinds of friends that you can't tell apart from family, then i guess you've got family! Much love to Shanth, Shiva, Gargesh, and Ashish, along with dear Vinali, my self-conscious guru, and the solid and ever-amazing Bhumika; and in the end, the main refrain seemed to be "You must come back, and come back to stay" from all quarters, which would prove an almost-undeniable pull - if only Baroda had a music scene! But alas(?), Gujarat is a dry state, with no alcohol or bars in which to hang out or play, and there is basically no scene for western music or musicians to peddle their musical wares.... Apparently there are plenty of classical Indian concerts, if i would like to truly convert and turn the musical page over to a life in India, or Baroda specifically; yet something tells me that being somewhere with the opportunity to continue performing my schtuff is going to provide the proper environment for the blooming of my heart.... We shall see"