He missed the Grammy Award by a whisker. But Buddhist monk Geshe Ngawang Tashi Bapu’s golden voice has earned him a large fan following around the world.

Geshe Ngawang Tashi or Lama Tashi as he is popularly known is from Arunachal Pradesh. His Tibetan Master Chants was nominated in the Best Traditional World Music Album category. It was for the first time that anyone from the North-East region was nominated for the Grammy’s.

Born in 1968 in remote Thembang village in the West Kameng district of Arunachal Pradesh, Tashi’s initiation in to Buddhist philosophy dates back in 1983 when he joined Gontse Golden Rabgeyling Monastery, also known as Bomdila Monastery in Arunachal Pradesh itself. But in the same year, he shifted to Drepung Loseling Monastery, which got relocated to Karnataka fro Tibet after Chinese invasion. It is one of the longest Buddhist monasteries in the world. At present Tashi is the principal of Central Institute of Himalayan Culture Studies at Dahung in Arunachal Pradesh.

His music is aimed at spreading peace, harmony and love. During his tours of the west, Tashi always emphasized on the value of natural respect, love and spirituality through his chants. His chants have become very popular in the west. His chants have also featured in the soundtrack of the Hollywood film Seven Years in Tibet starring Brad Pitt.

In April 1999, Tashi performed for Dalai Lama at Curitiba, Brazil. Later the same year, he enthralled the audience as the world festival of sacred music at Hollywood Bowl in Pasadena, California and Central Park in New York. He took the stage at Carnegie Hall in New York twice in 1997 and 1998 performing with musical greats like Philip Glass, Natalie Merchant, Michael Stipe, Patti Smith, Ben Harper, Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins and Sheryl Crow. Tashi is at present collaborating with musicians Lyle Sanford for an album that will also have instrumental accompaniments.

Grammy nomination is an honour that has come quite unexpectedly and took Tashi Lama by sheer surprise. In fact Tibetan Master Chants itself is a chance creation. In 1995, Lama’s musician friend Jonathan Goldman requested him to record his mystical chants in newly acquired recording equipment at his basement studio in his home in USA. A decade later, this recording has come up in the form of acclaimed album The Tibetan Master Chants. Since its release in 2005, it has taken the west by storm and it has even scaled the top ten charts in several countries. What has surprised Tashi immensely is the fact that a Grammy nomination has come even for a totally amateur effort. “This is absolutely common chanting and nothing scared or profound. The chants are the one which are commonly recited in our society. The recording was more like play. Thus I could not believe the nomination initially,” said the humble monk.

In Loseling Monastery in Karnataka, Tashi Lama mastered the monastic sacred dance and sacred chants known as Tibetan Deep Voice, a mull phonic singing technique employed in prayers. But this monastery has also created some problems for the ever smiling Lama as his voice has aroused the curiosity of scientists. Tashi Lama has a very interesting story to tell in this regard. In 1988, two groups of medical experts examined his throat to unravel the secret behind hic vocal chords. Same year twice during his world tour, doctors in Montreal in Canada and Florida in US conducted tests to find out how he would produce multi-phonic sounds that give the impression of several singers performing at once. He even had to go through the ordeal of a camera being inserted through his nose to look at his throat to unravel the secret behind his voice.

Tashi Lama is more popular in the west than in his own country. But the new recognition in the form of a Grammy nomination has made the whole of North-East, if not the entire country to take notice of him.

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