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Damodarastaka Prabhu was born in India and came in touch with the Sankirtan movement in the year 2005 in Mumbai. He joined Aindra Prabhu’s Kirtan party from 2009 to 2011 where he had the service of doing 6 hours of Kirtan everyday from 1-4.30 am and 4-7 pm. After moving out of the temple he still lives in Vrindavan and tries to participate for 2-3 hours of Kirtan everyday apart from his administration service at the Vrindavan Institute for Higher Education (VIHE) where he organises Bhakti Shastri and other courses. He’s part of PR, communication and advertising at VIHE.
In this episode you will hear him speak about the Kirtan standards established by Aindra Prabhu at Krishna Balaram Mandir in Sri Vrindavan Dhama.
Kirtan Premi comes from a generation of Kirtaniyas. His grand father from his mother’s side was one of the first Kirtan leaders in Mayapur Chandradoya Mandir. His grandfather from his father’s side was a Maharashtrian Bhakti singer. He received a lot of association of beautiful kirtaniyas who were professionally trained.
In 2008, he moved to Vrindavan and got association of Aindra Prabhu who nurtured him and gave purpose to his life. Music was always surrounding him since childhood, but he was never able to see the true value until he met Aindra Baba. Under baba’s shade he learnt the lessons of Kirtan, its value, its power and its mercy. Learning from his example Kirtan Premi got understanding of the essence and structure of Nama Sankirtan.
In this episode you will hear him speak about the Kirtan standards established by Aindra Prabhu at Krishna Balaram Mandir in Sri Vrindavan Dhama.
If you have a little bhava for Aindra Prabhu you should follow his rules for Kirtan which according to Martanda Prabhu are not so difficult to remember. In this episode of the Kirtan Standards series he explains among other things that Karatalas are very important, but that Mridanga is the heart of the Kirtan.
Martanda joined the Sankirtan movement in 1992 and met Aindra Prabhu for the first time in 1997. He recently relocated from India to the city of Krakow in Poland where he was born and raised. In 2017 he spent 4 months in New York City with Rama Raya and the NYC Harinam devotees doing 6 hours of Kirtan seva daily. He just got married last month at Indulekha Sakhi Mandir in Anjanoka, close to Varsana, and is currently observing the Purushottama month in Sridham Mayapur before going back to Poland.
As always, this episode also contains various Kirtan event updates. One of the oldest European Kirtan festivals is the Birmingham 24 Hour Kirtan which took place for the 19th year in a row on May 5 and 6. The organization team wrote on their Facebook page, that 1750 free tickets were booked. Madhava Prabhu has been part of this festival since the beginning and he also led the final Kirtan on Sunday evening.
(Pictures courtesy of Martanda Prabhu)
Aindra prabhu’s standards for Kirtan were uncompromised. In the last episode of the 24 Hour Kirtan podcast Acincana Krishna prabhu gave us a very good sense of Aindra prabhu’s mood with regard to Kirtan. In this episode one of Aindra prabhu’s main mridanga players, Gopal prabhu, continues to elaborate on the standards established by Aindra Prabhu during his 24 years of performing Yuga Dharma Harinam Sankirtan at Krishna Balaram Mandir in Vrindavan/India.
All of the recordings from this Kirtan Standards Series were produced by Ramacandra prabhu for new members of the 24 Hour Kirtan in Vrindavan, as well as for all new and old Kirtaniyas all over the world who are interested in performing Kirtan not only for their own pleasure and sense gratification, but as a means of attaining the highest level of pure devotion. Or as Aindra prabhu would say: Only the pure name can inculcate bhakti shakti into the heart.
Srila Prabhupada wanted 3 things to go on at Krishna Balaram Mandir in Vrindavan: a high standard of deity worship, free prasadam distribution with food for life and 24 Hour Kirtan. “These 3 things must never stop”, he said.
In the second part of this episode we will again be hearing from Aindra himself about the only real viable form of Bhakti, nama sankirtan. It’s part 4 of his room conversation about Kirtan Standards which is as uncompromised as usual. He was always cultivating and speaking about the highest form of Bhakti, exclusively for the satisfaction of Krishna, not some other form of Bhakti.
Aindra Prabhu doing Kirtan on Broadway Avenue in New York City in 1979
In this episode you will also learn about the progress of our Kirtan mobile app, our new RaydioKirtan.FM channel, a new Kirtan event in the Persian Gulf and Kirtan Space, a project which posted over 120 beautiful and inspring videos during the last 16 months about Kirtan related subject matters. So you’d better listen to episode number 4 of our Kirtan Standards podcast series on Soundcloud or Apple Podcast.
(Pictures of Gopal courtesy of Gopal, please do not use without his permission)
In this episode of the 24 Hour Kirtan Podcast Akincana Krishna prabhu will be sharing instructions he heard directly from Aindra Prabhu especially with regard to Kirtan. He will focus on some of the more practical aspects of Kirtan so that we get a sense of Aindra prabhu’s mood.
We’re also gonna be hearing again from Aindra himself about various practical and philosophical aspects of Kirtan which he shared in his room at Krishna Balaram Mandir in Vrindavan/India back in 2010. Aindra was a disciple of Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada who began leading Kirtans in the Washington D. C. temple, but after moving to New York City in 1981, he took the Kirtan into the street. After relocating to India he reinaugurated Prabhupada’s 24 Hour Kirtan at Krishna Balaram Mandir in 1986 and performed Kirtan Yajna for over 20 years. You can learn more about Aindra and download his Kirtan albums and live recordings on 24hourkirtan.com or if you’re not the downloading type just tune in to 24hourkirtan.fm.
In the first episode of this season we heard the head of the 24 Hour Kirtan department Banabhatta prabhu’s welcome message to new members of the 24 Hour Kirtan party. In the second episode, you will be hearing from Banabhatta’s assistant Vrindavan prabhu about the Kirtan standards established by Aindra Prabhu. You will also be hearing again from Aindra himself about Kirtan standards.
If you have been listening to season 1 of this podcast or just found out about it and think it’s worth listening, we’d really appreciate if you would consider writing a short review on iTunes which would help this podcast to get more visibility and of course help more people to learn about Kirtan in general and Kirtan standards in particular.
Thanks for listening and stay tuned on 24hourkirtan.fm!
Happy New Kirtan Year 2018!
It’s hard to believe that the last episode of the first season of this podcast, which contained a very inspiring interview with Gopal prabhu, was released already more than 16 months ago.
In the first episodes of season 2, you will be listening to 7 members of the 24 Hour Kirtan party in Vrindavan, speaking about the Kirtan standards established by Sripad Aindra prabhu. The recordings were produced by Ramacandra prabhu and we’re using them with permission of the new head of the 24 Hour Kirtan department Banabhatta prabhu who will also be the first to speak on the topic of Kirtan standards, followed by Vrindavan, Akincana Krishna, Gopal, Martanda, Damodarashtaka and Kirtan Premi. In addition to them sharing their personal experience doing Kirtan with Aindra Prabhu, you will also be hearing the king of Kirtan himself speaking about Kirtan standards.
We’re planning to release one or more episodes per month. Please comment below if you want to provide feedback or send it to [email protected].
After a peaceful summer here at 24 Hour Kirtan Radio we’ve finally been able to come up with episode #24 of our podcast which includes a quick recap of last weeks Zürich Janmastami festival and an amazing 1 1/2 hour interview with Gopal Prabhu about Aindra Prabhu recorded in spring 2016 in Sri Vrindavan Dhama.
Here are some beautiful pictures from the festival. The links and Kirtans from this episode are listed below.
In a lecture given by Vishwarup Prabhu at Sri Sri Radha Gopinath Temple in Chowpatty/Mumbai he mentions how Nanda Maharaja celebrated the death of Putana on the day of Holi. He also describes the beautiful Holi pasttime of Varsana, the birthplace of Srimati Radharani. Episode #23 of the 24 Hour Kirtan Podcast is all about Holi in Vrindavan, Varsana and in the rest of the world. We talk about the meaning behind the different colors and why Holi 2016 in Vrindavan was even more special, because at Radha Gopinath temple widows from Varanasi joined the celebrations for the first time.
There was palpable excitement as they smeared each other with Holi colours, as this was for the first time they played Holi inside a temple in Vrindavan. Bindeshwar Pathak, well known social reformer and founder of Sulabh International who has waged a steady campaign against ostracized widows in the country, also joined in the celebrations. The Sulabh International has been taking care of 1,500 widows in Varanasi and Vrindavan in the light of the Supreme Court’s observations in 2012.
“In an effort to bring them into the mainstream of society, Sulabh started organising Holi for them about three years ago at the widows’ ashram. But this time it is special as Holi was organised at a famous temple to give a kind of social acceptance,” Pathak told IANS, India’s Largest Independent News Service. A total of 1,200 kg ‘gulal’ and different coloured powders and 1,500 kg of rose and marigold petals were arranged for the special event. In many parts of India, widows are traditionally barred from playing Holi or participating in any other festival or auspicious functions.
Holi at Shri Banke Bihari Temple Vrindavan – Picture courtesy of Frantisek Staud
Here’s episode #22 of the 24 Hour Kirtan Podcast, recorded and published on Sunday 7, 2016. This is the 2nd episode in 2016 and we’re very excited to present it to you.
Although live Kirtan performances are 24 Hour Kirtan Radio’s main focus, on our podcast we also like to present and play modern Kirtan productions like Madi’s Bhakti Without Borders and Jahnavi’s Like a River to the Sea, both of which were among the top 20 conscious music albums of 2015, a competition launched by the Conscious Crew over at Soul Traveller Radio.
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