Listen to your inner voice: Loten seeks Sufi pitches

By Lobsang Wangyal - MusicTibet.com
Wednesday, August 02, 2006

Loten Namling is a maverick and a versatile man — singer, musician, actor, cartoonist, artist, an orator and a visionary. He is a robust by build but the most powerful part of him is his voice.

He grew up listening to Abba, Beegees and Boney M and Hindi songs such as "A dosti" (Sholay), "Tu me geeton may daloon ga" (Sawan ko annay do) and other songs from film Bobby. "Tibetans were awe-stricken with these songs and wondered how such melodious songs were made," Loten recalls. The first Tibetan song played with a guitar "Zay pay Rinzin Wangmo" by Thubten Samdup in late 1970s never became deadbeat for Tibetans.

Music must have been in Loten's Karma. Growing up in the Tibetan society influenced and inspired him into music. One particular song that hit Loten so deep to take up music was the song "Ama le ho" that has the lyrics — White Crane! Lend me your wings! I will not fly far, From Lithang I shall return — composed by the sixth Dalai Lama (1683-1706), from whom Loten draws his inspiration. Legend has it that the sixth Dalai Lama ruled Tibet in the daytime but in the nighttime revelry ruled him.

Loten's specialisation is in the field of centuries old "Nangma" and "Toeshey". He feels it is important to keep old songs alive because they have souls from long ago and they connect us to the past. "I was not born in Tibet but when I play these old songs. I get virtually transported back into the past, the Tibet that was."

However, he is not a conservative traditionalist neither speaks against the new and nascent array of contemporary and experimental genres and songs. What matters for him is to understand the value of the old.

After much research and consultations with experts and older Tibetans, Loten joined with those who believes the term "Nangma" to have derived from the Urdu word "Nagma", which literally means songs in that language.

Loten was inspired by his mother to learn Dranyen (a three-paired string Tibetan instrument) when he was of age 16. He received more lessons later from Mrs Ugen Choedon, when he attended the Tibetan Children's Village school in Dharamshala. He started music and stage artiste as a career right after he moved to Switzerland in 1989.

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Dedicating his life for Tibetan music and culture and having performed in hundreds of concerts, his most important show was before the Dalai Lama in June 2005 in Berlin. His reward was a blessing from the Dalai Lama and an opportunity of a tête-à-tête with him. During the meeting the Dalai Lama said, "Art is an important medium in preserving and continuing the Tibetan culture."

"His Holiness' appreciation for my efforts in promoting Tibetan music and culture was my biggest reward and it is my source of strength."

"Tibet blues" is Loten's new quest. He takes inspiration for this new venture from African blues. He gets the right feeling from Blues for his life in exile. He is going to Senegal to find out more about this genre and particularly Sufi music. "I hear Sufi elements in Nangma songs." The high pitch and melodious songs sung by Tibetans are how Sufi songs are sung as well. And since Nangma is mispronounced Urdu word "Nagma", he feels that these Tibetan songs were inspired by Sufism.

Loten has two albums to his credit: Songs of Tibet (1999) and White Crane (2002).