Beats Without Borders

Another year has passed and the members of Vancouver's Beats without Borders collective are certainly making a name for themselves. They have been invited to play at numerous events and festivals, including CelticFest Vancouver, Asian Heritage Month and the Vancouver International Bhangra Celebration. They toured the BC Interior, and played the San Francisco Bay area this spring as part of the Dhamaal Sights & Sounds Festival. Their experience, production, music collections, and versatile DJ abilities give them access to a range of dance floors, demographics and age groups, just as their name implies.

The secret of their success? There are four musical stalwarts behind BWB: Adrian, Lady Ra, Nils and Tarun. Following their individual and collective aspirations, they create and share monthly musical journeys with their growing audiences. In addition, Adrian Blackhurst is producing new material with a new album due later this year (www.bionicsoundsystem.com), and started a monthly dub night, DubTempo, in addition to his BWB involvement. Lady Ra has been on musical journeys to Tunisia and San Francisco this year, playing at parties and bellydancing events, and continually inspires those around her. Nils, the mastermind behind Telepaphone Productions, brought ethnofusion producers and DJs to Vancouver and produced the seventh anniversary Faeries and Fools Costume Carnival on the Sunshine Coast (www.faeriesandfools.com). Tarun Nayar continues to impress with his DJ and tabla-playing abilities. This year, he invented a rig he named the 'intergalactic space tabla.' By wiring his tabla through a computer interface and using foot pedals, controllers, and loopers, he warps the ancient sounds of the tabla into an entirely new dimension. His new album will be out in the fall.

Najma Akhtar

In 1987, a young English woman who had been trained for a conventional career, but who had also taught herself to sing, released a record called Qareeb (Closeness). The songs fused jazz and ghazals into music made for a voice to soar over - and it did - captivating listeners and critics on two continents.

No one had ever heard music like this before. Twenty years later, it is still just as true. Her collaborators through the years, in the studio and on stage, have included Peter Gabriel, Phillip Glass, Jah Wobble, Robert Plant, Jimmy Paige and dozens of others. But even though she continues to practice for hours each day, music is only one part of her life. She is also a playwright, an actor in theatre and film, a teacher in vocal technique, and a music programmer. Najma's personal history speaks to working hard and a lot of courage, two qualities that I am sure she must draw on when she leaves all these possibilities behind to go and help where help is needed.

She went to Bosnia in 1996. At a school for women and children, she taught English, listened to their stories and shared her own about living in a poly-cultural world. Her time in Bosnia included Ramadan, and as word spread about her trip, Muslims around the world sent her some of their earnings. The money was to be distributed to those in need, in keeping with the spirit of the holiday. In 2005, she was in Pakistan during the earthquake. She stayed for six months, organizing the distribution of supplies with the UN. Again, her actions inspired action and generosity, and proceeds from benefit concerts arrived to buy blankets, clothing and food. Recently, she's been working on a new record in Paris, which is, she says, "a little more daring." No doubt, once again, our ears will never be the same.

Vishwa Mohan Bhatt first studied music under his father. In a reversal of the same old, Bhatt continued his studies on sitar and violin while entering the Indian civil service because it seemed secure. At the same time, he kept modifying that guitar, trying to create an instrument on which he could play the music he could hear. He created the mohan veena (veena is Sanskrit for stringed instrument). It's clear when you look at it that there is a fusion of east and west at work. Made of pine, mahogany and rosewood, the body resembles the arch top, a familiar guitar here. The mohan veena has 19 strings: three melody, four drone and 12 sympathetic, which exert considerably more pressure than the six on a guitar. It's played with the same mizrabs (wire picks) as the sitar, but the other hand holds a polished steel rod, reflecting the influence of the Hawaiian guitar and, like the National Steel guitar, it is built to be heard.

It has already been added to the list of Indian classical instruments and was featured in Meeting By the River, a CD that captured Bhatt and Ry Cooder playing together one evening and won the Grammy Award for World Music. Ry was the first of many encounters with Western string stars. Since then Bhatt has made beautiful music together with Tal Mahal, Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas and Eric Clapton.

His son Salil is the 10th generation of Bhatts to pursue music, a heritage that one suspects could be a blessing or a burden. He, too, had his moment of doubt about music - even considering military school - before realizing there was music he wanted to hear that wasn't being made yet. Like his father, his solution was to create an instrument. The satvik veena is a variation on the mohan veena, built from a single piece of oak with a pine top. He continues to study with his father, while his father continues as the foremost disciple of Pt. Ravi Shankar. They are active teachers, composers and performing artists and it is an honour to have them with us this weekend. They will be accompanied by R.K. Mishra.