New album released on July 10th, 2022.
content:
Track 1: Offering to Yeshe Walmo
Track 2: Offering to Sipe Gyalmo and the Assembly of Guardians
musicians:
Kharnatsang: ritual drum (nga), rolmo (horizontally played paired cymbals), sil-nyen (flat bell)
Christiane Strothmann: production, sound design, harmonization, vocal arrangement, backing vocals
Tibetan text: For text as sung by Kharnatsang please see the (originally Tibetan) source: Menri Prayer Book (tib. ཞལ་འདོན་ཕྱོགས་བསྡུས།). Tibetan Yungdrung Bon Library, 2019. Menri Monastery.
credits:
Main and backing vocals, Tibetan instruments recorded at Strothmann studios, Wetter, Germany, by: Ch. Strothmann.
Final mix at ICEM studio 4, by: Ch. Strothmann
Artwork by Kharnatsang (idea) & Rebecca Ter Braak (design)
Track 1: Offering to Yeshe Walmo
Yeshe Walmo is one of the central deities to turn to when in need for immediate protection or healing. The text sung in „Offering to Yeshe Walmo“ is regularly pronounced by nuns, monks and lay practicioners on various occasions. It exists in slightly different versions and is known under different titles, such as „Invocation of Yeshe Walmo“, „Supplication to Yeshe Walmo“, and also „Prayer to Yeshe Walmo“. The Menri Prayer book titles the text „Yeshe Walmo Kül-wha“ (tib. ཡེ་ཤེས་དབལ་མོའི་བསྐུལ་བ།). Kharnatsang more often refers to the text as „Yeshe Walmo Solka“ (tib. ཡེ་ཤེས་དབལ་མོའི་གསོལ་ཁ). Which title you chose depends on the aspect you have in mind when thinking of the text text this particular moment.
Reciting the text or listeing to it is considered a way to strengthen one’s bond to the protective and curing power of Yeshe Walmo. This cannot be done on an egoistic way. An offering attitude must be developed and maintained in order to make her bestow her helping and rescuing power on oneself and particular circumstances. Therefore, when praying to her, any sentient being is included in one’s wish for protection and help. Thus, the text is not only a means to invoke Yeshe Walmo as our personal rescuer. Instead, Yeshe Walmo demands from us to generate compassion for others and by this to widen our mind so we can see beyond our own personal problems to the greater needs of the world.
Track 2: Sipe Gyalmo and the Assembly of Guardians
The wrathful female Goddess Sipe Gyalmo is the main protector deity of the Yungdrung Bön tradition, and the Menri lineage in particular. In Menri Monastery, she is turned to on a regular base together with four other guarding deities: Midü, Abse, Gyalpo, and Dragseng (to name them with their short forms). Since monasteries have individual protectors, the assembly of guardians will show differences between monasteries.
In track 2 Kharnatsang performs the five texts of the protector deities as recited one after the other in the context of Menri Monastery. All texts are published in the Menri Prayer book (see above).
- Sigyal (Sipe Gyalmo) (tib. མ་མཆོག་སྲིད་རྒྱལ་གྱི་ཀ་བསྟོད་བཞུགས།)
- Midü (tib. མི་བདུད་ཞལ་གཟིཊ་མ་བཞུགས།)
- Abse (Dragtsen Abse) (tib. བྲག་བཙན་ཨ་བསེའི་བསྐུལ་བ་བཞུགས།)
- Gyalpo (Gyalpo Sheldrab) (tib. རྒྱལ་པོ་ཤེལ་ཁྲབ་གྱི་གཏོར་བསྐང་བཞུགས།)
- Dragseng (Gyalchen Dragpa Sengge) (tib. རྒྱལ་ཆེན་གྲགས་པ་སེང་གེའི་མཆོད་བསྟོད།)