Bhakti Files #9 The Jimi Hendrix Experience

March 2, 1968.     

The Jimi Hendrix Experience live at Hunter College, New York City.....

This was the second time I saw Jimi live, but it's the one that I remember with more clarity. This was the night when my nascent belief that music was completely transcendental and transformational were fully and irrevocably confirmed. After a so-so set by Terry Reid and a beautifully psychedelic set by The Soft Machine, Jimi burst onto the stage with Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell and opened up the heavens. Starting with 'Stone Free', the cosmic showman mystically engaged the attention of all the concertgoers, like a master puppeteer pulling all of our strings. But then, moving into 'Foxey Lady', Jimi pulled us into deep infinite space. Do you remember how 'Foxey Lady' starts with that long feedback note? Well, this time Jimi let it linger, slowly building in intensity, shifting from liquid mercury to raging magma and back again, over and over. ONE NOTE!!!! Seemingly without end. And then into the funky, sexy groove..... I saw rainbows coming from his guitar, Demi-Gods, heavenly apsaras; I saw destruction and regeneration. Death and rebirth. And I saw all musical laws broken like twigs and scattered to the wind.... And I saw a musician/magician in complete control of his art, flying through the outer dimensions with total abandon... 

This was an introduction and initiation into the world of the musical shaman. And a perfect preparation for my many years of study with Ustad Ali Akbar Khan.

In the years following I've had so many dreams of Jimi, where he's joined me in Kirtan and guided my musical development. We're these true visitations or simply reflections of my own inner world? I don't know and I don't care. It doesn't matter because that night in 1968 Jimi Hendrix entered my soul....