Book Reviews

Every Garden is a Story: Stories, Crafts and Comforts

“Everything is changing, growing, aiming at something, but silently, taking its time,” writes Susannah Seton about her garden. Every Garden is a Story takes the same unhurried approach down the garden path. Weaving short personal recollections with recipes, tips and crafts, Seton finds joy in even the smallest garden. Some of her stories are nostalgic, such as her father’s quest to grow a seven-headed sweet pea, while others offer advice on dealing with clay soil and creating lasting bouquets. The recipes are straight forward and delicious, from stir-fried asparagus (with garlic, basil and fresh ginger) to a traditional Stuffed Garden dish (helpful when produce overabundance is an issue). Included also are directions for growing loofah sponges (they’re actually gourds) and aromatherapy basics for facial scrubs and natural headache remedies. Illustrated with inspiring color photographs, Every Garden is a Story is a reminder that tending a garden produces much more than vegetables and flowers.

How to Bury a Goldfish: and Other Ceremonies and Celebrations for Everyday Life

A simple goldfish garden burial is certainly more comforting than a flush. It takes little time, little effort and no money. Honoring small moments keeps us fully present but often in our busy lives we forget to acknowledge the daily ordinary happenings. How to Bury a Goldfish is a friendly reminder. With over 100 suggestions for simple everyday rituals, Virginia Lang and Louise Nayer guide us to fill our days with more meaning. Following an introductory inspirational quote, each ceremony suggests an easy-to-follow list of what you need (items cost next to nothing) and what you do. The rituals range from the light-hearted “Morning Shower” and “Celebratory Haircut” to sensitive issues such as “Losing a Job” and “Helping an Elder Move.” Noting events both milestone — getting a first apartment — and ordinary — cooking dinner — the art of simple ritual makes each day a celebration.

Sage-ing While Age-ing

Shirley MacLaine’s newest book Sage-ing While Age-ing is a funny, enlightened candid conversation with an old friend unpacking into her new house and forward into her life. Multi-award winning actress, consciousness trailblazing author and glamorous movie star (who insists at times she is “comfortably shabby”), MacLaine continues her open and honest narratives of her journey on the planet. Her wisdom has uncovered the strong power of synchronicity in her professional and personal lives and the unseen cosmic forces at work in the world today. She cares deeply about the planet and feels a new consciousness emerging (beginning a new era December 21, 2012). Of metaphysics, alternative medicine, UFOs, life, death and everything in between (and beyond) MacLaine affirms “I’m interested!” and finds leading researchers and scientists to answer her forward-thinking questions. “I like living on the edge of thought,” she says. Indeed. This is Shirley MacLaine at her sagey-ist.

Fearproof Your Life: How to Thrive in a World Addicted to Fear

Our post 9/11, 24-hour news world is filled with politicians and pundits telling us we should be afraid. Fear is so pervasive in our society, and we’re so practiced at managing it, we assume it’s normal. But according to psychologist and addictions counselor Joseph Bailey it’s not normal, and we are actually addicted to fear. Equating fear to a train (going in the wrong direction!), we board with unhealthy thinking early in life and unconsciously surrender our power to steer for ourselves. Fearproof Your Life is practical instruction for undoing this limiting ego-based cycle and getting off the train to reclaim a fearless life. Our true Self knows fear as a Divine tool, a type of intuitive radar which energizes our bodies and warns us of danger. Using a process of honoring and listening, and moving beyond positive thinking, Bailey guides us back to the wisdom of our true Self to create a less frightened world.

Books on Fire: the Destruction of Libraries throughout History

Libraries are temples of learning. An early library was a “House for the care of the Soul.” The idea a vast library existed even before the creation of the world is a vision shared among the Hindu, Hebrew, Nordic and Islamic traditions. Yet nearly as old as the reverence for the written word is the desire to destroy it. Though we may think of book burning as an evil in the past, Books on Fire uncovers the longstanding tradition of library annihilation from ancient times through, tragically, today. In this new translation, French historian Lucien Polaston pursues the events and lost treasures of this devastating practice, including 2003 when “fire, pillage, and simple destruction claim almost all of the Iraqi libraries following the American ‘libervasion.’” Books on Fire continues by examining the newest danger facing free reading: digitalization. No longer a temple, the new Internet library is a collection of “virtual books” made available by on-line publishers whose interests are largely profits and not the sharing of learning.

Stoking the Creative Fires: 9 Ways to Rekindle Passion and Imagination

Phil Cosusineau is a passionate, unconventional and inspiring mentor. Following the wisdom of decades’ worth of artistic journeying in filmmaking, writing and teaching creativity, Stoking the Creative Fires leads artists of all kinds into the bold process of creating. Using the metaphor of fire, Cousineau uses antidotes, exercises and interviews as kindling wood to ignite (or re-ignite) the artistic flame in all areas of life. With wit and charisma he moves the artist through three stages: Inspiration (firing of the imagination); Perspiration (avoiding burn-out); and Realization (doing the real work and passing the torch). Cousineau’s stature and career reputation allows him to deeply interact with a multitude of talents and this guide book is bursting with a lifetime of lessons learned from these meetings. Conversations with an eclectic cast of characters, ranging from Kierkegaard to baseball player Ty Cobb to Chicago janitor and visionary painter Henry Marger, reveal the heat of an artistic life style available to anyone.

Simple Ways: Towards the Sacred

Gunilla Norris has an extraordinary gift for celebrating what some perceive as mundane. In her newest offering, as in her previous books (such as Being Bread and A Mystic Garden) Norris turns her meditative attention to everyday things and lifts them to a higher level. In Simple Ways Norris beautifully guides her way through a day’s or year’s worth of experience towards the Sacred: with Our Bodies; in Our Dwellings; with Our Every-Day Things; and in Our Gratitude. “My way has been a householder’s way,” explains Norris, and she finds glory in the householder’s things available to each of us: the floor, a stone, the staircase, the table, our daily bread. A blending of meditation, prayer, wonder and poetry, Norris looks to her ordinary life and sees that she is standing in sacred space. An accessible reflection for all spiritual backgrounds, Simple Ways helps us embrace the significance of our surroundings right where we are.

The Painting Path: Embodying Spiritual Discovery through Yoga, Brush and Color

The Painting Path is a playful imaginative resource combining spirituality, art and yoga as a way to explore the important yearning to create. Moving through it is like a fantastic painting workshop with a wonderful teacher. Encouraging and talented painter and yoga instructor Linda Novick combines these two aspects to create colorful “juicy” art with an open uncritical mind and centered body. The format of The Painting Path is easy to follow; a spiritual theme begins each segment, then a yoga exercise designed to flow easily into the art project. The yoga exercises are accessible regardless of experience, as are the art projects moving from a simple experiment in oil painting to the more challenging painted autobiography. Novick provides great tips on buying art materials and advice on preparing a comforting supportive space for practicing yoga and painting. Filled with inspiration and surprisingly deep awareness, this is an enthusiastic call to the inner artist.

Music and DVD Reviews

Soulfood: SpaScapes Massage

No wonder Soulfood’s liner notes devote scant space to details about their music; their best compositions invite you to leave the world of details behind. This compilation, intended for yoga, meditation and massage, contains seven extended tracks drawn from six previous SoulFood releases. With such titles as “Dreaming,” “Soaring” and “Bliss,” they live up to my Massage Magazine critique affixed to the cover: “This is great stuff. Ideal for floating away!” Gordy Schaeffer, aka DJ Free, and Peter Schimke create SoulFood’s immediately recognizable sound. Schaeffer began playing music at the tender age of 8, and has since charted Top 15 on Billboard and won Best Score for IMAX® Extreme. Although these boys also create “world, rhythm and chill” tracks, their most mellow compositions, including everything on this CD, is the stuff of dreams. SpaScapes Massage features the kind of spacey fare that encourages the spouse to mutter, as she/he climbs into bed, “Play that some more, honey.” An ambient mix of piano, electronic keyboards, Native flutes, woodwinds, crystal bowls, chimes, and thankfully unobtrusive nature sounds, the music ambles along to the blissful land of nowhere in particular. Which is quite a lovely place to be. Check out SoulFood mp3 Radio at soulfoodmusic.com. Though the music sounds much fuller and warmer on CD, even a brief listen will convince.

Oliver Mtukudzi: Tsimba itsoka

If you only listen to the music, with its amiable, dance-inducing rhythms and infectious spirit, you’ll have no idea what Oliver Mtukudzi is singing about. In fact, the accompanying saxophone riffs by Samson Mtukudzi might occasionally — just occasionally — lead you to believe you’ve encountered an African Kenny G. But if you check out the liner notes, you discover that Zimbabwe-based vocalist Oliver Mtukudzi’s seemingly carefree music addresses men who go about deceiving innocent youngsters, creatures whose footprints leave clues to their beneficence or danger, learning to listen as others speak, rejecting disharmony and hate in favor of love, and making a difference by praying together for the nation. In other words, this is music of a people who, even amidst hardship, suffering and addiction, manage to celebrate their joy. Mtukudzi, who has recently established the Pkare Paye Arts Centre in Norton, Zimbabwe, is so beloved in his country that he is known as “Tuku.” He began recording over 30 years ago with a band called Wagon Wheels, then formed his current wonderful back-up band, Black Spirits. Singing in Shona (and in English on other discs), his lyrics about political turmoil, AIDS, economic issues, and personal integrity have made him his country’s best-selling artist. Bonnie Raitt has called Tuku a “treasure,” and used his music as inspiration for the song “One Belief Away.” Tuku’s soulful artistry exemplifies music’s potential as a catalyst for change.

Zina Schiff, violin, Royal Scottish National Orchestra - Ernest Bloch: Violin Concerto

Rarely does an internationally distributed classical artist personally petition for a review. But when Bay Area/Boston-based violinist Zina Schiff suggested I might be moved by the spiritual content of her renditions of music by Ernest Bloch (1880-1959), I seized the opportunity. Born in Switzerland, Bloch immigrated to the United States in 1916, where his music was championed by leading conductors. Soon he was directing music programs in Cleveland, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and UC Berkeley. Most widely known for his Sacred Service, commissioned in 1927 by Temple Emanu-El of San Francisco, Bloch devoted the last 28 years of his life to composing. Although Bloch attributed the major themes of his great Violin Concerto (1938) to “Indian” songs he heard in New Mexico, the influence of Jewish cantorial chants bring to mind another incongruous confluence, the sounds of the Bohemian woods echoing through the Native American and “Negro” melodies of Antonín Dvorák’s New World Symphony. This deeply considered, moving music is often filled with drama. The disc also contains Baal Shem, whose title refers to the visionary “miracle worker” founder of Chasidism. Its three fanciful movements are explicit in their references to Jewish life. Suite Hébraïque, written when Bloch was 70, is a visionary suite whose final movement celebrates the founding of the then-new State of Israel. Despite dry recorded sound, Schiff and Bloch’s mastery and commitment shine through with commanding presence.

John Eliot Gardiner: J.S. Bach: Cantatas Vol. 16 - (New York) for the Sunday after Christmas

Noted early music specialist John Eliot Gardiner began his unprecedented Bach Pilgrimage in Weimar on Christmas Day in 1999, concluding in New York 53 weeks later. Traveling with two of his prized ensembles, The Monteverdi Choir and The English Baroque Soloists, Gardiner managed to perform all of Bach’s 198 surviving church cantatas on the appointed feast day within a single year. With new cantatas learned, rehearsed and performed every week, the unprecedented pilgrimage produced a remarkably high level of singing and playing.

A companion to two previous releases devoted to Bach’s cantatas for Christmas, this CD captures the final concert of Gardiner’s achievement. How singers and instrumentalists managed to travel long distances, rehearse on the fly, and deliver such heartfelt, polished performances is proof of their devotion to Bach. Given the heavenly simplicity of the vocal and instrumental artistry on this CD, it’s hard to imagine that anything less than divine intervention made these performances possible. Volume 1 won Gramophone’s 2005 Baroque Vocal and Record of the Year, Volume 13 won France’s coveted Diapason De L'Annee Award, and Volume 15 was nominated for a recent Gramophone Award. The series appears on the label named after the initials Bach wrote on each of his cantatas - SDG for Soli Deo Gloria - "to the glory of God alone." Glorious indeed.

Kim Kashkashian/Robert Levin: Asturiana

Many great Spanish and Argentinean composers have written songs so melodic, colorful, and passionate as to make instrumentalists jealous. Rather than coveting singers’ privilege, violist Kim Kashkashian and pianist Robert Levin have created a beautiful CD of song transcriptions. The artists don’t content themselves with copying note-for-note; instead, vocal lines are sometimes altered and expanded, registers changed, and non-vocal effects added for extra expression. Given that Levin excels in improving embellishments and cadenzas for the music of Mozart, and Kashkashian is one of the most expressive violists around, the results are supremely tasteful and compelling. Especially in the slower, more inward songs, Asturiana resonates on such a heartfelt level as to have inspired a panel of international music critics to nominate it for a MIDEM chamber music award. While ECM includes translations of the songs to enable us to understand what Kashkashian and Levin are “singing” about, these musicians manage to speak eloquently without words. The soulful artistry on this disc merits high accolades.

Ann Licater: Following the Call

So here I am trolling for greeting cards in Sagrada, my favorite progressive Christian/spiritual store in Oakland, CA when I hear the mournful sound of a wood flute. Gravitating toward the CD player, I spy the cover of Following the Call. My thought, “Oh how I wish CDs like this came my way for review,” must have been formed with great intention, because a subsequent look through the piles of review CDs perpetually threatening to consume our casa revealed that Following the Call had in fact arrived at my doorstep.

Licater, trained in classical silver flute and the healing arts, discovered the power of Native American flute at a powwow. Improvising on wood and clay flutes made by eight different contemporary artisans (all of whom she generously credits in the liner notes), Ann’s free-form CD is ideal for relaxation and meditation. Yes, many of these flutes inevitably bring to mind the sounds of a mourning dove searching for its mate, but the longing calls for oneness and union. If I had to choose one word besides “spiritual” to characterize Licater’s music, it would be “open.” Translation: Yes!