A whole new avenue of commercial viability of Buddhist hymns

[krsna]

 

Have Hare Krishna devotees won any awards for their temple chants?

 

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Buddhist Monks Win a Grammy

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/printedition/300304/detCIT04.shtml

 

NEW DELHI, INDIA, March 29, 2004: It's still a mystery how a CD of

sacred Tibetan hymns, not widely circulated, muscled its way onto the

Grammy jury panel. But creativity is known to break barriers. Monks of

the Sherab Ling monastery, some 60 km from Dharamsala, achieved a

first, winning the Grammy for the best traditional world music album.

This award had earlier been won by Pandit Ravi Shankar and Pandit

Vishwa Mohan Bhatt but they didn't produce religious works. Even Tenam

La -- representative of the monastery who received the award on

February 8 at Los Angeles from Sophie Hawkins -- throws his hands up in

the air, declaring: "We do not know. Maybe because of blessings of our

Guruji."

 

All they know is last year a New Zealand couple had recorded their

chants live in their monastery. "These chants are performed routinely

at the monastery everyday and an award was the last thing on our minds.

Last year, Tai Situpa Rimpoche, founder and supreme head of the

monastery, asked us to do the chants for a recording session," La said.

The album titled is available at all international stores and

amazon.com. "We are making enquires as to who all are marketing it," he

said.

 

"We knew nothing about the Grammy nomination until someone called up.

Since I was in LA, I was instructed to receive it," said Tenam La at a

press briefing. He admits that this has opened a whole new avenue of

commercial viability of Buddhist hymns but rues that not a penny from

the mysterious marketing of the Grammy album has reached the monastery.