I feel blessed to have been born into a musical family. As a small child, I loved to sit beside my father while he played piano and be with him while he worked producing music. We grew up in Calabasas CA where my parents wanted to raise us, away from the city where we could spend most of our time outdoors eating ripe fruit from the trees and playing on a tire swing hung from an old oak tree. My Nana used to tell me how I loved music and was always bopping my head up and down in my high chair. My Grandaddy was a singer/dancer and musician too who ran away from home as a teen to join the traveling Vaudeville show. Nana said she always recognized that spirit in me too. My older sister loved to have us put on variety shows for the neighborhood; she would dress me up and put me on the fireplace to dance to her Beatles records in hippie beads and a pink Tutu. By the age of seven I knew what my passion in life.
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It was at that time when I was first exposed to Eastern Music, Philosophies and Mantra. I would sing along with my favorite song by George Harrison, "My Sweet Lord". I remember dancing around my room playing it over and over on my record player, freely singing out, "Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Rama Rama...". I would hear those words again a few years later when my father would take us to Laguna Beach in the summers where we would rent an apartment next to the Hare Krishna Temple. I was curious hearing the chanting and smelling the sweet champa drift into our window while my brother Alan and I would string our puca shell necklaces.
When I was 16, my whole life changed. My Mother died of breast cancer and I decided to move to Nashville to be with my dad and develop as a recording artist. It was there that I found my first spiritual community. In the heart of Music Row there was a vegetarian restaurant called "Country Life" where they would serve lunch every day. On warm days, I would sit out on the long community tables and meet people who were more conscious of what they ate and on a similar spiritual path. Being around the community there made me feel at home.
After finishing high school in Nashville, I returned back to LA where I began to pursue my dreams. I found the East West Macrobiotic center in the heart of Hollywood that would become a special centering place for me. I would exhaust myself running around to auditions, dance classes, voice lessons, spending the nights on the couch at the local recording studio hoping the producers there would hire me to sing. Then I would go to the East West center, to attend a lecture or sit down with my book and run into like-minded friends. It was there by the frozen Amasake machine that I met someone who told me about yoga classes at a nearby studio on Robertson. I had just turned eighteen when I began and Rod Stryker was my first teacher. He was inspired, full of devotion and beautiful! The poses really helped to open up my body as well as protect me from all of the dancing that I was doing. I studied there for a few months then went back to just dance classes. I spent all of my time trying to get a job as an entertainer so I wouldn't have to work 4 waitress jobs at the same time to get by. It wasn't until years later that I would come back to yoga.
I had started performing with Madonna when I was in my early 20's. A few years later, when we were rehearsing for another tour, I watched her constantly stretching and doing poses. I saw how the meditation was changing her and decided that I would like to get back into it. At that time I had been working on my own music as an artist being really inspired by world music. I met Dave Stringer at an Indian furniture store and many world musicians like Greg Ellis, Hans Christian and my musical partner, cellist Cameron Stone. I began to play the harmonium and decided that I needed to make the music that would bring forth what was in my heart. We all began to support each other with our devotion in our music. I began to chant mantras with Dave's band and sing along with Jai Uttal records. I remember one fun evening when we played at a French restaurant/dance club chanting mantras and playing our drums drowned out by the pumping dance beats! I decided to leave the big record company that I was signed to and be an independent artist. I began to think so differently about the real power of music, wanting to use my gifts to heal. I had my harmonium wherever I went so I began to always sing with it and write all of my songs on it. Naturally my music took on a more meditative, hypnotic and devotional quality.
Now I live in the mountains of Topanga Canyon, CA, surrounded by oak trees, vegetable gardens and fruit trees once again. I always dreamed of growing my own food and getting back to living in nature this way. I am continuing on this path creating music inspired as ever by my family, being in nature, the great spiritual teachings and yoga. I am blessed to have two daughters Sofia, 7 and Luciana, 1 yr, (another head bopper) and a beautiful husband that supports me in every way. My life is dedicated to experiencing more and more Joy and exploring the human and cosmic mystery in every moment. I have always wanted to know what lies behind the visible world. Every day we intend to raise our children this way knowing that we are one with all, with the infinite. I am in awe of this life experience, this miracle and when I sing it is my way of saying THANK YOU! My favorite moments in my life now are learning to just be, holding on to every baby breath from Luciana and watching Sofia learn to read and write. I am so grateful to be sharing my music at this year's conference in San Francisco. I look forward to us all coming together to share this cosmic dance, to sing out and celebrate our oneness!
