Yeshu Satsang Toronto
Where: Emmanuel College Chapel, Free
About this Event: Since 2009, Yeshu Satsang Toronto has been hosting free monthly Indian devotional music nights across the GTA. The events feature a unique blend of traditional Indian instruments like sitar and tabla with a Western music influence. Husband-wife duo Chris Hale and Miranda Stone perform in Hindi, Sanskrit, and other North Indian languages, joined by Luke Parker on harmonium.
Yeshu Satsang Toronto has hosted a free monthly Indian devotional music night at venues across the GTA since 2009. Blending traditional Indian instruments such as sitar and tabla with a western music education, husband-wife duo Chris Hale and Miranda Stone sing in Hindi, Sanskrit and other North Indian languages, accompanied by Luke Parker on harmonium.
In 2002, Miranda was touring her third folk-rock album, 7 Deadly Sins, and met Chris at a music festival. The two of them fell in love with each others’ music, and eventually each other, before getting married in India in 2004.
Chris had recently returned from having lived in South Asia for 25 years. His interest in bhajan and kirtan musical traditions led him first to write a masters thesis on the subject, alongside of his role as guitarist and vocalist for a touring Indian rock band in the 90’s. Returning to North America in 2000, Chris co-led the band, Aradhna, producing eight albums of Hindi language devotional music; a hybridization of traditional bhajan, western folk, and post-rock.
A student of world music, Hindi language, and piano, Luke magically appeared at the key moment when Yeshu Satsang Toronto was in desperate need of a sensitive and dedicated harmonium player. With a superhuman patience for riding the waves of husband-wife musical discussions, Luke is the third, absolutely essential, strand in the bond of shared spiritual practice, deep listening, community, humour, and ecstatic music in celebration of the Divine.