“Sudama” is a CD collection of original songs, poems, lullabyes, and ballads, by Sudama Mark Kennedy as well as classic poems set to original music. Perfect for intensive and repetitive listening as well as perfect background music that is both soothing and energetic for all kinds of warm-hearted environments. If you combine James Taylor’s more baritone voicings with Sting’s or Lorena Mckennit’s Anglo-literary bent and world influence, as well as the heart feeling of a Stevie Wonder song with Sade’s mystical edge, you get Sudama’s mytho-poetic healing landscapes supported artfully by Sapphron’s delicious sax tone. A truly unique CD! Sudama Mark Kennedy, M.A., Ph.D. (abd) Religious Studies is a Santa Barbara, California based healer, spiritual teacher, scholar, poet and musician who grew up all around the world with his diplomatic family. The recipient of the United Nations Award “Uplifting the World with Oneness Heart” Sudama combines poetry, soulful music, and exotic instruments with strong healing intention to create experience that is spiritually uplifting as well as entertaining. For more information see www.sudama.com. Sapphron Obois’ remarkable soprano and alto sax playing can be heard on numerous professional recordings over the past two decades and on her own CD releases. “Kennedy has that storyteller’s voice…a timbre that calls one…to a world that’s real …because it’s imagined... music to celebrate.” George Yatchisin, Santa Barbara Independent, December 10th, 1998 “Auspicious…mellow gold…” D.J. Palladino, Fringe Beat, Santa Barbara Independent, December 10th, 1998 “Sudama brings a winsome grace to his life-loving world music sensibility… soothing…” Healing Retreats and Spas, March/ April 1999 Caught An Angel Got My Attention, December 5, 2001 Reviewer: A music fan After Caught an Angel it was all icing. It was the best collaboration in a very long time. Such emotions and blending. Just plain GOOD story telling...and instrumentation More More and More. superlative!, September 22, 1999 Reviewer: A music fan What a joy to hear such an excellent new artist! This incredible album is exactly the kind of music that I've been searching for. Not only are the songs themselves wonderful but the misicians are really outstanding. This album does something that is incredibly difficult to do, namely it is calming AND energizing at the same time. At first I was really digging a few tunes alot, but after listening a little deeper I began to hear subtle things that actually, well I guess just made me want to hear more. Thank you and MORE!!! A Cloud of Bliss, September 20, 1999 Reviewer: A music fan There was a time a while back when I did a good bit of writing about music for Time Magazine--still do, occasionally, although now I've turned to film scripts for creative release, and to music like the sounds of "Sudama" for inspiration. This is a truly ravishing and inspiring collection of songs from deep within a creative spirit that manages both to be beguilingly open and teasingly private. "Sudama" is an invitation to meditation and exploration that has antcedents not only in New Age but in the restless inventiveness of Coltrane's jazz and the Dead's peaceable, funky kingdom. A wonder. “Sudama” is a spirited, heartfelt, world folk jazz journey with an edge, which includes three Rudyard Kipling poems from the Jungle Book put to music for the first time: “White Seal’s Lullabye” “Shiv and the Grasshopper”, “Hunting Song of the Seeonie Pack”. “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod” the eternal lullaby by Eugene Field (circa 1895) is given new life by Sudama’s mystical oceanic music. “El Nino” begins softly and blows up an instrumental gale of Sapphron’s sax and Sudama’s shakuhachi against zither waves and a guitar bass line. “Caught an Angel” is your muse flapping her wings. “Awakening” is a spoken word invitation to understand the wisdom of the body and the wisdom of Mother Earth against compelling and propelling tablas and trance guitar, with a triumphant sax coda. “Beshr the Barefoot” is a sitar, sax, bass and doumbek celebration of a Sufi mystic who gave it all up for God. “Sailor’s Bid” is Sudama’s original haunting love ballad featuring Sapphron’s piano and sax. “Flying Girl Waltz” and “Meganne’s Water Music” are instrumental 6 and 12-string steel acoustic guitar pieces respectively, in DADGAD tuning. After listening to the last four songs your child (and/or inner child) should be in a delicious state of bliss or peaceful sleep, whichever comes first. Players: Sudama Mark Kennedy (vocals, spoken words, 6 and 12-string steel and nylon acoustic guitars, sitar, shakuhachi flute, zither), Sapphron Obois (soprano sax, acoustic piano), Joy Julks (acoustic and electric bass), Montino Bourbon (sarod), Homnath Upadhyaya (tablas), Jill Miles (backup vocals), Steve Miles (bass on Awakening), Megan Yalkut (back up vocals), Jeff Lidke (tablas on Wynken), Candy Girard (violin), Jonathan Kessler (doumbek).