(Reuters) – The Dalai Lama bid for music chart stardom on Monday, when he turned 85, with the release of an album of mantras and teachings.
FILE PHOTO: Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama speaks to journalists in Geneva, Switzerland, March 11, 2016. REUTERS / Denis Balibouse / File Photo
“Inner World” begins with the song “One Of My Favorite Prayers” and continues with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader reciting meditations and sayings with accompanying music.
The album was produced when musician Junelle Kunin, a student of the New Zealand Dalai Lama, contacted him in 2015 with the idea, and to his surprise, he said yes.
“I thought I would have to try to convince him,” he told Reuters in an interview from his home in Auckland.
“That moment of recording it, OMG, I was shaking like a leaf before I got in there,” he said.
Kunin made the initial recordings at the Dalai Lama’s residence in Dharamsala in India.
Once at home, she worked with her husband Abraham and other musicians to produce music for the tracks.
“It is an incredible honor. But it was incredible, discouraging like trust and responsibility. It is huge, ”said Abraham Kunin.
In a promotional video for the album, when asked why he had agreed to participate, the Dalai Lama replied, “The purpose of my life is to serve as much as I can.”
The launch comes five years after Patti Smith led the crowd at Britain’s Glastonbury Festival singing happy birthday to him for his 80th.
Sarah Mills report; Written by Andrew Heavens; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky
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