The Snow Lion Roars in the Palm Trees:
Tibetan Refugee Music in India
In south India along the side of a
highway six hours west of Bangalore a bustling Tibetan refugee community goes
about its business, quite unnoticed by the world. Bylakuppe is home to the
largest community of Tibetans outside of Tibet, with a population estimated at
twenty thousand souls. An onerous application process keeps any overnight
visitors out, and has had the effect of maintaining Bylakuppe as a pure bastion
of Tibetan culture, prayer flags flapping serenely in the palm trees. No less
than five monasteries dot the agrarian landscape. Half the population at any
time is made up of monks and nuns. Tibetan schools and town halls, homes,
farms, restaurants, and businesses fill the rest.
I went there with a singular purpose
– to learn Tibetan folk music from a qualified teacher, and to see what I could
learn about Tibetan culture through that music. What I found was a rich and
vibrant culture, continually evolving as it holds on to its roots, trying to
maintain a balance between full modernity and cultural preservation. Folk music
is a driving force in the lives of the refugees. It is social cement, bringing
together families and communities around a shared sound and heritage. It is a
tool for creative expression, for singing of loves lost and gained, of devotion
to principles and people, of frustrations and ecstasies. It is sacred rebel
music, a key instrument for protest against the ravages of their homeland and people.
In short, it is an art form central to so much of modern Tibetan life, and,
sadly, in acute danger of being lost in the winds of political uncertainty and
cultural diffusion.
In 1959 the Chinese occupied Tibet.
India gave asylum to the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s most sacred and respected
political and spiritual leader, and thousands of refugees. India’s kind
solution was to provide substantial plots of land for the Tibetans’ use as
refugee camps for as long as needed. The Dalai Lama moved to Dharamsala, a
small village above an old English hill outpost called McLeod Ganj, and began
the Tibetan Government-in-Exile. Among the first actions of the new government
was to set up a school for the preservation of Tibetan art forms, and so before
the first monastery or temple was built, the Tibetan Institute of Performing
Arts was erected and staffed. The Tibetans began to spread throughout India,
the majority congregating in the jungle in Karnataka State that was to become
the collection of camps at Bylakuppe. After years of labor and many deaths from
new diseases and new snakes, a plot of jungle was cleared and the agrarian
lifestyle of the refugees could commence.
Fast-forward fifty years. Monks wearing
mirror-shades and Nike rip-offs zip along well-paved roads on sleek motorcycles.
Thousands of students learn Tibetan, English, and the sciences in two major
schools, staffed mostly by Tibetans. The fields are orderly and verdant;
farmers chat on cell phones while they direct cattle pulling plows. Tibetan
food – delicious pot-stickers called momos
and an infinite variety of noodle soups called thukpa – is still the main fare, but many families cook south
Indian cuisine just as well. The third generation of Bylakuppe refugees is
rising, with new citizens fresh from the Himalaya arriving every month. The
only foreigners are a few students from the United States and one or two brave
souls who are hiding out without a Protected Area Permit. Bylakuppe is modern,
it is most certainly in south India, and it yet remains wholly Tibetan. This
phenomenon of Tibetans adroitly mixing with other strong cultures while
remaining themselves is, however, not a new occurrence.
The Metropolitan Shangri-La
In the mind’s eye, physical Tibet is a
final frontier, an unexplored and vast frigid landscape of unspeakable beauty
and impossible mysticism. Its inhabitants are shepherds and wizards, warlords
and bejeweled aristocrats. Above all things, Tibet is remote and isolated, cut
off from the world by cloud-capped mountains on one side and infinite barren
expanses on the other. Tibet’s pristine isolation, however, is more invention
than reality. There could hardly have been a more metropolitan society, by
ancient standards. Muslims and Mongols shared Lhasa, the illustrious capital
city, with the high Lamas. The Chinese royal court made frequent appearances,
and the reverse was also true – Tibet’s most visible citizens spent months and
years living abroad, taking part in all the intrigues and scandals of the
court. Tibetan medical doctors, philosophers, and traders traversed the globe –
China, India, Mongolia, Nepal, Russia, Greece – bringing home ideas and
artifacts while spreading Tibetan notions of Buddhism, medicine, and commerce.
Notable evidences of this trade and
interplay appear even in Tibet’s most prized and lauded instrument, the
lute-like Dramyen. The music teachers and friends I made in the community
readily admitted the bulk of Tibetan instruments to be Chinese in origin,
simply modified to Tibetan tastes and circumstances. For example, the Tibetan
violin called Pi-wang is simply a
larger version of the Chinese Erhu,
providing increased volume appropriate for dance music in wide-open spaces. The
Dramyen, however, is claimed to be a Tibetan original, a sacred and august instrument,
and as such is the only Tibetan melodic instrument to play a crossover role as
a device of religious implement and secular entertainment. Gods and goddesses
adorning the local temples are as frequently seen with Dramyen as are kids in
shades and designer jeans. The Dramyen, as uniquely Tibetan as it is, shows
strong evidences of influence from Mongolian and Chinese sources. The Dramyen I
bought is typical of one of three main styles of tuning box decoration. Mine
has a geometric head, simple and unadorned, with graceful lines. The other two
head styles are sumptuous and intricate – one is styled after a horse’s head,
powerful and aggressive, and the other is a multihued dragonhead, usually
over-the-top in complexity and detail. The horsehead motif came from Mongolia,
where the “horsehead fiddle” is ubiquitous. The dragonhead is of Chinese
descent, where it graces Erhu and
other stringed instruments. From this simple example, it is easy to see the
complex and interwoven nature of Tibetan culture, and to extricate oneself from
a too-simple view of the isolated residents of Shangri-La.
Milarepa and the Rebel Lama
Recognizing Tibet’s cosmopolitan
flavor does not prevent recognition of some of its most singular and, from a
music culture point of view, most contributory citizens. The whole of Tibetan
life is tied up in its distinctive form of Buddhism, and it follows suit that
two of the heroes of Tibetan music were important Buddhist leaders.
The first was Milarepa. In any
Tibetan thangka painting, he is
easily recognized by his emaciated figure and green skin, both gained while
subsisting solely on nettles as he meditated for years in solitude in a snowy
mountain cave. A joyful ascetic, he embodied spontaneity, living in the moment,
and love of the spiritual aspects of the natural world. He was known to break
into song at any given moment, and often with little discernable impetus,
extolling spiritual truths, asceticism, and exalting the features of the
landscape around him in parable. He set a precedent for and lent credence to
songs describing mountains, rivers, lakes, forests, and all of the animal
denizens. These profound songs are common in the Tibetan folk vernacular.
The second, more scandalous and
human hero of Tibetan folk music was none other than the VI Dalai Lama, a rebel
youth who shed the trappings of his high calling and spent much of his time drinking,
carousing, chasing women, and writing songs. He was universally loved by the
people, and universally worrisome to the clergy. His songs are full of longing,
of love, of angst, and occasionally the candid yet transcendent spirituality
expected of the highest lama.
17
Even if meditated upon
The face of my lama comes
not to me,
But again and again comes
to me
The smiling face of my
beloved.
The honest candor of this song is easy to relate to for most of
the people I met in Bylakuppe, including (perhaps especially!) the monks. The
next song showcases the strong visual nature of many traditional lyrics.
47
It snowed at dusk
When I searched for my
sweetheart.
Now the secret cannot be
kept;
In the snow my footprints
remain.
The
simple image of footprints in the snow at dusk, an austere sight filled with
the warmth of emotion of the young lover, remains with the hearer and forever
changes the common sight of a lone set of tracks in the virgin snow.
Descriptions like this, sparse yet powerful, are common in Tibetan folk music.
56
The garrulous parrot
Please stay with your mouth
shut.
The thrush in the willow
grove
Has promised to sing a song
for me.
Wit and straightforwardness are also common markers of folk
tunes, and this one in particular shows the face of wit and even irritation in
the face of the “garrulous parrot,” or the clergymen that disapproved of the
Lama’s liaisons with the “thrush in the willow grove.”
58
White crane!
Lend me your wings.
I shall not fly far;
From Lithang, I shall
return.
(All songs and song numbers taken from The Songs of the Sixth Dalai Lama by K. Dhondup)
Part of the special station of the Dalai Lama is an ability to
choose the location of his next rebirth, and the last of these songs was
recognized after his death/murder/disappearance (depending on the version of
history) as a hint to help his followers find the VII Dalai Lama. The VII Dalai
Lama was indeed found in Lithang, having passed all the tests associated with
becoming a recognized reincarnation. Thus this VI Dalai Lama was seen not only
as a folk hero, the voice of the common people in a society ruled by the
clergy, but also as a true embodiment of the purest type of holiness, boldly
refusing the fetters of outward accessories while yet displaying the spiritual
power of a god.
Though the Tibetan folk music
tradition is criminally understudied by scholars, Tibetologists, and ethnomusicologists,
it nevertheless holds a vital place in Tibetan culture in modern times. The
examples set by Milarepa and the VI Dalai Lama have been followed without
interruption, and the songs of Tibetans in exile echo love for their lost
landscape, Buddhist philosophy, and the angst of young love and unfulfilled
longing for lover or home. Added to these are the powerful messages of protest
songs. Some of these songs are completely new, rock songs with power chords and
drum sets. Kiela Diehl, in one of the only works on modern Tibetan refugee
music, follows the Yak Band in their quest to unite the diaspora through rock
protest ballads. Particularly interesting to me are the old songs, once
innocuous praises of Tibetan culture and the Dalai Lama, now transformed into
protest by politics as the process of cross-acculturation continues in the new
refugee venue.
Soong
Dhang Laymo
The first song I learned to sing and
play on Dramyen was Soong Dhang Laymo, an old song that falls into this second
category of protest. On the surface, none of the lyrics are incendiary or
revolutionary: “What is the precious jewel of the Norbulingka? The Chosha Yishi
(one of the Dalai Lama’s titles, also approximately translating to “precious
jewel”) is the jewel. What is the precious jewel of the Norbulingka? The young
men of Tibet are the jewels. What is the precious jewel of the Norbulingka? The
women of Tibet, with their jewelry of turquoise and coral, are the precious
jewels. What is the precious jewel of the Norbulingka? The children of Tibet
are the precious jewels.” This song, written in some time in the lost annals of
history, was originally a song of praise to the Dalai Lama and of love for the
Tibetan people. However, in the refugee context, the lyrics cry defiantly that
the people are not broken simply because they are not “home.” This song with
its original lyrics and meaning would draw severe punishment if performed in
Tibet, where every image of the Dalai Lama, aural or visual, is outlawed. These
refugee Tibetans are not in their motherland, but they brought their most
prized treasures with them in the person of the Dalai Lama and the strength of
the rising generation. Burn the Norbulingka, kill, rape, and plunder, and the
Tibetans will yet not be dead. Tibet will yet not be dead. Precious jewels are
indestructible.
I was asked to perform this song at
the year’s most auspicious celebration, the Dalai Lama’s seventy-seventh
birthday, on July 6th. To fully understand the weight of this
celebration, it must be considered that the Dalai Lama is, quite literally, the
living deity of the people. In the refugee context, he is the symbol of hope
and the strong leader that has kept the diaspora unified. Every year he lives
is another year of hope, especially as many begin to doubt that another
charismatic and able leader will rise to take his place and fill his shoes. The
death of the Dalai Lama is seen by some as the death of the struggle to save
Tibet. There is no person or concept more beloved of the Tibetans.
I asked my teacher, Dawa-la, why he
wanted me to perform this song at the celebration. He told me that many Tibetan
children and teenagers do not fully appreciate or understand the culture they
come from, having never set foot in Tibet. A reminder that the Tibetan musical
tradition draws people from all over the world would also be a reminder to the
children of the power and value of their culture. An “Inji-Mi,” a Western man,
playing this song on that stage seven thousand miles from his home would be a
powerful image for the youngsters, one that will never leave. A tall, white,
blond-haired blue-eyed Christian came and sang – not one of his songs, but one
of ours – for His Holiness the Dalai Lama. This image represents the worth of
the music, the support of people in the West, and the compassion taught by the
Buddha in accepting all beings as relatives, regardless of race or creed.
Never once did I feel the cold shoulder I
might have expected. I was one of eleven performances, the only solo, and the
only foreigner. My participation in the sacred event of another culture might
have been met with opposition or discomfort, were it anywhere else. The
eagerness of my teachers and friends to share their traditions with me is a
sign of the robust and lively nature of Tibet in exile. There was no
defensiveness, neither was there hurt or disgruntlement where the failure of my
country to reprimand China and restore Tibet was concerned. From what I felt
talking to friends before the performance, and from the response of the crowd
after the performance, everybody was interested in moving forward, in holding
on to peace and accepting any offerings of love regardless of their source.
The stage was a concrete platform beneath
a colorful array of canopies covering the capacious lawn in front of the Dalai
Lama’s palace in Bylakuppe. When I arrived, I was surprised to find that the
“palace” was a rather humble house set in the middle of a field of grass dotted
by towering trees. It turns out the only good translation for the Tibetan word
for the places the Dalai Lama stays when he travels to the various settlements
is “palace.” The crowd gathered around three sides of the stage, and the fourth
side met with the covered porch of the palace where the dignitaries were
seated, where the Dalai Lama would sit were he not attending a similar
performance in his home base in Dharamsala in North India. The performers,
myself included, performed not facing the crowd, but the dignitaries and the absent-in-body
high Lama. The party, after all, was for him.
The opera singers, lion dancers,
children’s groups, and school troupes took their turns on stage, exuding
national pride and devotion to the Dalai Lama. The crowd responded
enthusiastically, laughing and cheering at the right moments. When my time
came, I stepped on stage as Palden, another of my teachers, adjusted the
microphones. I started to play the instrumental introduction, and as soon as
the melody was recognized, the crowd erupted. Being surrounded on three sides
by thousands of people in close proximity heightened the effect on me, and I
watched as the dignitaries smiled and serenely nodded in the same recognition
the crowd had just had. As I plunked my way through the song, an amateur at
best, the crowd alternately went silent to hear the lyrics, and then clapped
and cheered uproariously during the instrumental sections. It was a heady
experience, overwhelming – I even forgot to play the instrument for most of a
chorus and got caught up in singing with the crowd. For the last verse, a
repeat of the most known lyrics, the crowd drowned me out. In all the
performances I have been a part of over the years, none has paralleled this
experience for sheer crowd participation and excitement. It still humbles me to
think about it. Maybe sixty people in the crowd knew me. Yet the response to my
performance was by far the most extreme of the day. Why were they so
enthusiastic?
I will not pretend to understand all of the
reasons for the incredible reception the performance received, but I will
relate the responses I obtained from people I talked to after the performance.
Several people told me how much they loved that song, and how much that song
meant to them. A woman from Third Camp, the same camp we lived in, had
graduated from the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts and immigrated to
Canada where she continued to sing. Her YouTube version of Soong Dhang Laymo, a
reinterpretation with drum machines and synth pads (a prime example of the
natural evolution and cross-acculturation of Tibetan refugee music), had
recently gone viral in the community. There was local pride in her
accomplishments, and my act of bringing the song “back home” completed the
circle. Others, the elderly in particular, were happy that I sang in their
language and that the words could be clearly heard. Kiela Diehl describes
Tibetan refugee response to well-enunciated Tibetan-language poetry in song as
a central part of the enjoyment of their music. I was dressed in traditional
Tibetan clothing, at the behest of Palden, and this compounded the positive
response of the elderly and traditionalists to my singing in Tibetan. This combination also, incidentally, gave me a
happy source of trouble the rest of my stay as everybody then assumed I spoke
Tibetan (whereas everybody before assumed I spoke none and therefore communicated
in English). Many people I met were simply proud of their culture and music,
and related to me how happy they were that I enjoy it too, as a Westerner. The
longest lasting response I could observe was the revival of the YouTube version
of Soong Dhang Laymo – I heard it blare from community loudspeakers and cafes
several times a day in the month after the performance. As I would pass people
in the street, they would start to sing or whistle the melody, usually followed
by a fit of laughter and a hearty “Hello! Tashi Delek!” when I made eye
contact. Everybody knew the song before – it is one most learned on their
mothers’ knees – but it became ubiquitous after. The song generated so much
excitement that, despite my weak and halting performance, I became a celebrity
for the last month I was in Bylakuppe.
Reflections
After the Performance
I have thought for months about this
experience and what it meant, and what it means for the Tibetans and the rest
of the world. I am yet unable to look at the experience with the cool eye of a
researcher, so powerfully has it touched me. It changed who I am. Maybe a few
years’ time will enable me to make a more detailed analysis of what happened,
the implications for future researchers, etc. For now, let a few thoughts and
feelings suffice. As I said before, the performance was simultaneously botched
and the absolute most successful performance I have ever given. The reaction
the crowd gave was not in response to my technical ability, which most
performers hope to wow the audience with (and, truthfully, spend too much time
on), but rather in response to the love with which I performed and, above even
that, the song itself. I have never felt such emotion from a group in response
to a song in any venue. I had also never lived among a group of refugees. These
people are united in pain and passion and cultural heritage. The refugee
spirit, though at times depressed and downtrodden, is formidable, potent, and
nigh indestructible. It springs back, and any sign of life and happiness is
celebrated, be it the smallest iota. It is inspiring to watch. It imparts hope,
not just for the Tibetan diaspora, but for all of humankind. If a song can
elicit such a response, then not only is music an important part of Tibetan
expression and heritage, it is an important part of human expression and
heritage. It changed the way I look at music and how essential it is to the
make up of my being. It changed the way I viewed my research and vastly
increased the amount of importance I place on the preservation and promulgation
of folk musics. This stuff is not just for guys from the Smithsonian with fancy
microphones – it is for everybody.
And, in the Tibetan case, I became convinced that the work of preservation and
promulgation needs to start now.
Current
Dangers and Next Steps
In Bylakuppe and elsewhere in the Tibetan
diaspora, the folk music canon is still largely held in the minds of the
musicians. Though there is wide oral dissemination of this music, proper
archival work of diasporic music as it
stands will serve in preserving and disseminating the art form to a world
audience, and will guard against loss due to any future upheavals in Tibetan
life. The Dalai Lama’s death, change of policy by the Chinese or Tibetan
governments, etc., could all cause a great loss of memory as the Tibetan
community either regroups or further splits. Though Tibetan culture is robust,
the political situation is undeniably precarious, and action must be taken to improve
the musical database available to refugees and any other interested persons.
Moreover, the special expression of musical values in the current community is
unlikely to be remembered in the wake of either happy or sad endings for the
diaspora. The universal human value inherent in the honest and difficult
struggles of refugee expression will be lost if not immediately recorded.
In addition to the problem of the
impending loss of current refugee expression, the fact of the wide variety of
musics from within Tibet that are housed in the minds of musicians has gone
overlooked by researchers and, frankly, by Tibetans. The song I sang was from
Lhasa, which is recognized as the center of Tibetan culture and therefore
houses the normative art forms. However, I could have performed songs from any
number of provinces and villages, each with their own unique style. Dawa and
Palden, my teachers, each had mastery of various styles from various places,
and none of this is adequately recorded in any easily accessible format. The
few regional songs that make it on to YouTube represent only a tiny fraction of
the variety of Tibetan musical expression, and a thorough cataloging of the
repertoires of musicians such as Palden and Dawa would greatly expand
understanding and advocacy of what might be fading, non-central, non-normative
styles. The alternative is to risk a repainting and homogenization of the rich
variety found outside of Lhasa.
The suggestion and call is for
researchers to a) create the first generation of English-language treatises on
the variety of Tibetan musics, with recorded examples, and/or b) seek out
Tibetan-language treatises on the same subject, if any exist, and translate
them. The diaspora in India is a prime source for both projects, as it is
concerned with preservation, willing to contribute, and much more accessible
than Tibet itself. For those not involved in research, the call is to seek to
understand and appreciate this folk music, to see the ways it impacts the
diaspora in Bylakuppe and to allow some measure of its hope, happiness, and
emotion to rub off. The story is a Tibetan story, a refugee story, and most of
all it is a human story that impacts every one of us. To lose it would be to
lose the thoughts and dreams of generations; to preserve it would be to
preserve one of the greatest sources of life and expression in the entire human
family and enable it to inspire generations on into eternity.
