Japaka Orchestra

Japaka Orchestra is an ensemble of Czech and Slovak enthusiastic amateur musicians who play and sing songs of the world-known spiritual Master Sri Chinmoy. Sri Chinmoy has composed over 12000 songs in his native Bengali and over 7000 songs in English. From this vast creation Japaka Orchestra chose mostly short mantric incantations, sensitively creating their own arrangements. Although Sri Chinmoy´s music sounds more like Eastern music, Japaka Orchestra presents it in a very colourful way, being inspired in their arrangements by various styles, e.g. jazz, funky, folkrock or even rap. Why is the goup called "Orchestra“? Although it is not a classical orchestra as the name indicates, there is a variety of instruments from traditional Indian tabla, harmonium and sitar to accoustic guitar and percussions. For many years Japaka Orchestra offers small, accoustic concerts besides the Czech Republic and Slovakia also in other European countries, like Germany, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia, Croatia and Italy. These concerts are usually accompanied by a meditation lecture or a slide show. According to the old Indian tradition there is no entrance fee at these concerts. Playing at ultra races is another significant activity of Japaka Orchestra. The musicians are also fond of sports. Having run a few marathons themselves, they know very well how much encouragement do the runners need, best of all with live music. Japaka Orchestra is one of the first groups that played at the Prague International Marathon, in1998. Since then they have played at this marathon every year. Japaka Orchestra has also become a traditional attraction of Sri Chinmoy Marathon Team races in both the Czech and Slovak Republics. At the Impossibility Challenger 2004 in Munich Japaka Orchestra set their own record – 27 hour playing non-stop. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.