Track Listing

1. Om Hraum Mitraya
2. Om Namah Shivaya
3. Guru Rinpoche Mantra
4. Aad Guray
5. Homage to Krishna
6. Om Purnam I
7. Om Purnam II
8. Brahma Nandam

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2544 in Music
• Released on: 2005-04-05
• Number of discs: 1

Album Description
Mantras are rapidly becoming the music of choice for people seeking solace in sound, and Deva Premal, dubbed by one reviewer as "the Enya of mantra," is the voice they're turning to. With close to 400,000 CDs sold worldwide and a buzz of interest from ardent fans ranging from yogis, therapists and alternative health practitioners to Cher and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Deva Premal and her partner Miten have achieved a huge degree of recognition in the blossoming niche world of yoga music.

Deva Premal's music is driven by a simple yet elegant vision: "everybody with a voice can sing, and everyone with a breath in their body can experience their divinity...we share with others the healing power of music, and the bliss that it brings." The phenomenon of her groundswell of listeners is living proof that mantras are as relevant today as they were thousands of years ago.

Featuring Deva Premal’s transcendent voice layered in a chorus of lush harmonies, Dakshina is a celebration of the divine, perfect for yoga and relaxation.

Amazon.com
Chant is a new marketing niche in the alternative music scene, and swings from albums of straight recitations to a glut of electronica mantra CDs. A group like Rasa turns chants into cinematic excursions. Singer Donna DeLory recasts chants as pop hooks and Krishna Das growls them into guttural ruminations. But the German singer Deva Premal was doing the mantra thing long before it became a commercialized trend.

On Dakshina, Premal, along with her partner, guitarist Miten, converts chants into serene, almost easy-listening refrains. Premal has a warm alto that she deploys on rhythm-free chorales of Enyaesque vocal layers to downtempo, world-beat grooves. With her chants harmonized and repeated into infinity, the effect can be like an ocean surface. It's constantly flowing and in motion, but doesn't have a lot of focus. But on songs like "Guru Rinpoche Mantra" or "Homage to Krishna," a wave rises and carries you down its face in a slo-mo free fall. Premal keeps it mostly acoustic, filling in ornamental lines with acoustic guitar, tamboura, and bansuri flutes. Only the orchestral strings occasionally get in the way. Her previous albums have often been sappy in their new age aspirations, but on Dakshina, she's more naked, stripping her sound down to a deeper emotional core. --John Diliberto

About the Artist
Deva Premal and Miten’s music is an invitation into the nature of love and inner wisdom. The couple have been living and playing together since 1991, releasing a string of acclaimed CDs along the way. Their concerts have touched the hearts of seekers throughout the world.

Deva Premal, best known for her top-selling chant CDs, is a classically trained musician and gifted singer. Years after their release, her albums THE ESSENCE, LOVE IS SPACE and EMBRACE are fixtures on New Age charts and popularity polls in record shops, yoga studios and healing centers worldwide.

Miten, originally from England, began as a singer-songwriter-guitarist in the 70s opening for such groups as Fleetwood Mac and Ry Cooder. He then discovered the power of meditation and left the world of rock ‘n’ roll behind.

Deva Premal & Miten originally met at an ashram in India. One morning, Miten was sitting on the edge of his bed playing guitar when Deva Premal spontaneously began singing harmony with him. Miten was astounded. "Her voice is such a pure expression," says Miten, "there’s no ego in it. That may be what touches people…"

Singing mantras has been a passion for Deva Premal since childhood, and with nearly 400,000 CDs sold worldwide, she & Miten are living proof that these ancient texts are as relevant today as thousands of years ago. Deva Premal and Miten have made it their mission to travel the world sharing their precious gift of music. After almost 15 years of performing in front of enraptured audiences, Deva Premal notes that "more and more people are coming to the celebration."

Deva Premal and Miten’s audience has expanded to include a notable range of leaders and teachers from many disciplines. Whether it’s a private audience with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, motivational speaker Tony Robbins, bestselling author Eckhart Tolle or platinum artist and yoga practitioner, Cher, Deva Premal’s soulful rendering of these timeless sounds strikes a powerful chord.

Customer Reviews

Gorgeous
This music will wrap you in beauty. This is my most favorite of Deva Premal's cds. There are no translations of the mantras, as in her earlier cds, but the exquisite presentation and layered harmonies more than make up for that. Definitely worth having for yoga, meditation, cleaning house, driving, calming children :) and centering one's self right smack dab in the middle of the fact that you are alive!

An Enticing Invitation
Dakshina picks you up and carries you gently yet powerfully to deep inner realms...spiraling, spiraling down to a space of incredible relaxation, silence, and joy.

It plays in my house for hours at a time, creating a lush refuge, and such an enticing invitation to return to the stillness pulsating at the center of all of our crazy cyclones.

If I had enough money, I would buy a copy for every political leader on the planet. Om shanti, shanti, shanti....just imagine if you can...

Truth and Beauty Transports
It is my feeling that listening to Deva Premal's latest release DAKSHINA can be a transforming experience. In my opinion, it is her best effort so far. The human voice is capable of communicating tremendous depth and emotion. And Deva Premal does not disappoint. Her voice brings a message alive with love, devotion, and meditation through music that is nothing if not beautiful--beauty embracing truth. If you surrender to the listening and travel in you will not be disappointed.

V. Banik