Whispering Sky: Tenzin ChoegyalWith New Album, Performance in Saratoga Springs 

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Tibetan artist and composer Tenzin Choegyal will journey to Saratoga Springs to stage an intimate performance on Nov. 3 in support of his just-released album “Whispering Sky.” 

The album, released on the community-focused label 4000 Records, clocks in at 50 minutes and features eight tunes laced with instrumental tones known to western ears – pianos and winds, guitars and a string quartet among them, as well as beautifully foreign sonics of the bansuri and tabla, tuned glasses and gongs that mesh In the altogether as a soundscape of the collective subconscious.

Forced into exile, Choegyal resides in Australia where he continues to blend traditional Tibetan music of his ancestors with contemporary influences to produce a music connected to his nomadic roots and Buddhist practice, offering listeners an immersive experience that transcends geographical boundaries.  

“Tashi Delek and many greetings to you,” he writes from his home base 10,000 miles from New York and on the opposite side of the world. “Hope this finds you in a great space of being.” The space is “Whispering Sky.”

“I created this album in my home studio and it turned into a global project – featuring some of my closest friends and collaborators,” says Choegyal, who produced the album that features his voice, dranyen – a Tibetan lute, and lingbu – a bamboo flute, throughout. The album first took shape in his home studio in Brisbane and welcomed an international cast of talented collaborators who accompanied him in recording studios in Toronto and London, and Tokyo to New York.

“It was a time of challenge and opportunity,” Choegyal says, “and creative collaborations with artists worldwide.” 

The Tracks 

A simple pluck sets the baseline beat of the album’s opening track “Rawang Freedom.” Eighteen times the beat repeats, inspired by the Heart Sutra and welcoming as companions the strum of an acoustic guitar and the harmonious chanting of hidden angels traversing across a silhouetted terrain, trusting a guiding light to illuminate the path to freedom and in the process gifting listeners with the graceful yearning to phonetically chant along. 

At the crossroads of silence, more passengers are invited join along on the ride, each offering a different  perspective: 

“Kyema The Roof is leaking” provokes thoughts of a vast room where workers are at play with their noisy tools of reconstruction. Once inside, they present a curious contemplation: While a leaky roof may appear a hinderance at the visible surface, beyond it awaits the blessing of open-sky dreaming, urging the listener to experience previously undiscovered things. 

The mediative and transcendent “Dolma Whispering Sky” reveals tight vibrant chants to set the rhythm foundation, rising in open-throat voicings and resulting in the elevation of spirit to fill the vanishing point of the most ancient of halls. 

Jhala A Big Hug. Happy melodies, a changing of time, playful, bright and augmented and accessorized with pleasurable time-changes. “Jampa A Big Hug” – Tenzin sends big, warm hugs to everyone.

Nightingales. The sound of a flute streams through the darkness its trailing embers lined with the awakening of a new day. To western ears, the landscape is tinged with a familiarity of Peter Gabriel’s travels to the African continent, and sparse East Asian piano of Kitaro-isms. 

Gyallu Tibetan Anthem, composed around 1950 and sung in Tibetan communities-in-exile around the world. Here. It is performed with no lyrics, serving as a reminder that singing this anthem is prohibited throughout Tibet.

I Fly To You.  A glee-filled four-minutes which in a perfect and just world would settle atop the charts of pop hits, in an expression of the longing to be with loved ones once again. 

Kailash Roof Of The World. Ascending the Himalayas with syncopated foot-stepping and soaring up, high as the mighty mountain itself when suddenly sidewind in the emotional cross-stitch of simultaneous turmoil, glory, blessings and curses. 

Tenzin Choegyal will stage a solo performance at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 3 at the Arthur Zankel Music Center on the campus of Skidmore College. The intimate show seats the audience onstage with the artist and will utilize the setting sun as backdrop in the showcase.  

Tickets are limited and are $20 general public; $5 Skidmore community (students, faculty, staff, alumni, and retirees). Go online at https://www.tix.com/ticket-sales/zankel/7074 or call the box office at 518-580-8381. For more information about the artist, go to: https://www.tenzinchoegyal.com/.