One Track Heart: The Story of Krishna Das

(USA, 2012, 73 mins)

Executive Producer: Andrew Jones
Producer: Jeremy Frindel
Cinematographer: Jeremy Frindel
Editor: Jeremy Frindel

Special LIVE Q & A with Ram Dass & Director Jeremy Frindel immediately following the screening.

Not Yet Rated

Starting in 1996 with a string of ten popular albums, American singer Krishna Das has gradually become the most influential performer of kirtan—that is, Hindu-style devotional singing—known in the Western world. His story echoes the cultural ups and downs of yoga itself in America.

To put things too simply, we experienced profound interest in yoga during the '60s and '70s, shallow mockery under the influence of disco-slash-hiphop, and now, hmm…. Target stores carry about 5,000 yoga-related products. In the US anyway, a lot of people are saying, "Let's look at that yoga thing again."

No doubt Krishna Das—originally a rock-and-roller from Long Island named Jeffrey Kagel—would agree with Jerry Garcia: What a long strange trip it's been.

In 1970, inspired by having met Ram Dass, the young musician now known as Krishna Das went to India and immersed himself in the influence of the guru Neem Karoli Baba. A few years later the guru cast off his mortal shell and left his devotee rootless. After a lost interval, the subject of this candid documentary found his feet again through the music of kirtan, now rendered in manner as Western and direct as effective to growing new audiences. "I try to loosen people up," he says. "I want to sing to God, sing to my open heart. It's a hootenanny!"

- PW

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