Singer (Conversations)

Expressions researched:
"singer" |"singers"

1971 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation with Mayor -- November 10, 1971, New Delhi:

Prabhupāda: So only you have got only mṛdaṅga? Why?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think more are coming from Calcutta. Śyāmasundara called me.

Prabhupāda: At least four khols you want to have. Four khols and sixteen men, that is party. Yes. And one leading singer and one dancer. That makes complete party. Twenty, twenty-two men. So where is Śyāmasundara?

Devotee: I didn't find him.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Devotee: I didn't find him anywhere.

Prabhupāda: He is not here? Huh? Resting? (background discussion among devotees) He went to bed very late last night?

Room Conversation with Dr. Karan Singh, -- November 25, 1971, Delhi:

Śyāmasundara: She wants to write the words of the mantra on a piece of paper.

Prabhupāda: What is that? Hare Kṛṣṇa?

(break)

Dr. Singh: Harrison. So our devotees, they (indistinct) that singer of the Beatles.

Prabhupāda: He gave me nineteen thousand dollars.

Dr. Singh: Did he?

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Dr. Singh: (indistinct) "Words from Apple."

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) Śyāmasundara. (indistinct) find out.

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation with Indian Ambassador -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: Now just like Sir Padampat Singhania of Kanpur, he promised that, "You just construct a nice temple in New York." He wanted to give the money. The government will not allow.

Ambassador: Oh, foreign exchange.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Not allow. I made correspondence with the government. The last reply was that "You can raise fund locally, but you cannot take money from here." Now who will pay...? Of course, these boys are paying me. We are getting... Now recently, one boy, you know his name, George Harrison. He's a very famous singer.

Ambassador: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So he has purchased for me one house, fifty-five lakhs worth. But what, no Indian could help me. At two hundred and twenty thousand pounds. So it is equivalent to fifty-five lakhs.

Ambassador: But I'm told that you have fifty-five temples in the west...

Prabhupāda: No, why fifty? More than fifty... In U.S.A. we have got about fifty temples. And Australia, also, we have got five temples.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- February 21, 1976, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Come on. Money problem, we shall solve. You come and join. Preach. Where is the objection?

Acyutānanda: In America that is called "entrepreneur."

Prabhupāda: What is that?

Acyutānanda: If you back and forward another man to... Usually it's in entertainment, to be a famous actor or a singer, then a man will be behind, supplying money and publicity and everything.

Prabhupāda: (break) ...well, let them translate all our English literature. We shall publish in Bengali.

Acyutānanda: I don't think they have that.

Prabhupāda: Ah, yes.

Morning Walk -- June 4, 1976, Los Angeles:

Rāmeśvara: So they can actually create, by their control, a depression.

Prabhupāda: Yes, money can buy. The real thing is money. That is stated in the Bhāgavata. Money is the criterion in the Kali-yuga. If you have got money, then you don't require anything; you can purchase anything.

Rāmeśvara: Purchase justice.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes, anything. That is stated in the Bhāgavata. So therefore people are trying to get money somehow or other. Then he knows, "I get all power." The present struggle is everyone is trying to get more, more, more, more money. Because everyone knows if I get money then I.... (static) Just like the Beatles and others. Actually what they have got qualification? They have got money. (static) That's all. What qualification? Singer. Singer, according to Vedic culture, third-class, fourth-class man.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śūdra.

Hari-śauri: Most of these famous guys, they are all really the lowest grade people as well. Very low grade.

Prabhupāda: Otherwise, this John Lennon, how he dares to photograph naked with his lover? How lowest class man he is, that he has no shame even. And he's also big man. Press reporters go to take his opinion on certain subject matters. They do not know where I am going to take opinion. What is the value of this man? But people are after money. Why? "I have got money." That's all.

Conversation with George Harrison -- July 26, 1976, London:

George Harrison: I was going to go to Bombay for a wedding. Some friends are getting married.

Prabhupāda: When?

George Harrison: December the fifth, I think.

Prabhupāda: Very nice season in Bombay. Best time.

George Harrison: You know, I think you met Laksmi Shankar, lady singer? Her daughter, who is also a singer, Viji, Viji Śrī Shankar, and she's marrying a South Indian violin player, L. Shankar.

Prabhupāda: He's also Shankar?

George Harrison: Well, he's called L. Shankar. You know that South India they have a funny way around them, they have like a surname. He's just called L. Shankar. His brother is called L. Subhramanyam.

Devotee (1): George says he wants to spend some time in Vṛndāvana.

George Harrison: I was only there for about thirty-six hours last time.

Prabhupāda: We have got now very good centers. Another gentleman, he's offering us a very good place at Mahābaleśvara. That's one of the famous India stations. A very nice climate. So you can come and stay there. We have got now many good centers.

Room Conversation -- July 27, 1976, London:

Prabhupāda: He is so rich(?) man. He cannot get nice food even, the primary necessity. Getting jaundice.

Jayatīrtha: The main reason why he doesn't.... I think he got jaundice because, he admitted, is that he had Ravi Shankar's brother cooking for him.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Jayatīrtha: He had Kumar Shankar, the brother of Ravi Shankar, cooking for him. So this man is a demon; therefore he is becoming sick.

Prabhupāda: Yes, they are all drunkards, all third-class men, fourth-class men, low-class men. In India, this naṭas, they are third class, fourth class. Naṭas means the artist class, singer, dancers. They are meant for the fourth-class, fifth-class men. It was never taken by the.... They are called, and they will expertly sing, dance, in some festival. The brāhmaṇas, kṣatriyas, vaiśyas, they were not doing. Still in India there is a class, very expert in dancing, singing, low class. Their hereditary business is like that.

Evening Darsana -- August 9, 1976, Tehran:

Ali: Is the seeing important?

Prabhupāda: No, important. No, because if you have no eyes to see spiritual, you have to see physically, and they are all physical. Either you see with your eyes or touch with your hand or smell with your nose or lick up with your tongue, everything is physical.

Ali: I can feel the presence of the thing dominating things.

Prabhupāda: Presence is there, because just like a nice mango. So you cannot appreciate this mango simply by seeing. Natural tendency when you get a good mango, you smell. So why not see? Sufficient? Why you smell? So these are all misconceptions. Different things have to be realized in different processes. Suppose you are a good singer, I see you. So I cannot appreciate simply by seeing you. I shall ask you, "All right, please sing one song." When I hear you, then I shall appreciate. Is it not? So the physical experience by different senses, gross and subtle senses.

Ali: Our senses are imperfect.

Prabhupāda: Senses are imperfect always. Therefore we have to develop the perfect senses. That is spiritual. Just like you are working with your hands, this is physical. But this hand is not working. The spirit soul within the body, he is working. As soon as he is out, what is the value of your hand? When the spirit soul is out of your body, then I am asking you, "Mr. Ali, Mr. Ali, get up." Who is hearing? Your ear is there, but you cannot hear, finished. Therefore the spiritual senses, that is real sense. Do you follow what I say? You have got ear, but when the spirit soul is out of your body, in spite of possessing this physical ear, you cannot hear.

Morning Walk -- August 14, 1976, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: We have no tap water here?

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: We have tap water, but it's not drinking water. I mean it needs to be boiled. In Delhi you can drink the tap water, they say it's okay, but in Bombay it's very risky to drink tap water. Especially in monsoon. (break) ...famous actress and singer called Shri Lakshna-pandit. She's one of our devotee's sister-in-law also. She has some devotion. So she is coming to sing bhajanas tomorrow in the pandal. Is that okay? She's very famous.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: It's okay.

Prabhupāda: Before Deity one can do. Before Deity one can show devotional activities, but not otherwise. Otherwise it will be sense enjoyment.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: In Vṛndāvana once you told me not to have the rāsa-līlā by these professionals also.

Prabhupāda: No, before Deity everything.

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

Conversation with Yogi Amrit Desai of Kripalu Ashram (PA USA) -- January 2, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Billiard-playing or some exhibition of singing, and hundreds of men will gather. And they were feasting, first-class food. In this way spending, spending, spending... And then prostitute, aristocracy. In this way one property and one property lost, everything. At last I saw him going by rickshaw. One day it was raining, and I saw that he was sitting in a rickshaw, and no friend asked him that, "Haren Babu, why you are...? You come to my car," so many. And he was friendly to so many zamindars, kings, and very intimate with... But they lost of everything, and nobody cares. His sons, they are of our age. I do not know whether living or not. But most probably they are not living. They became professional singers, coming of such aristocratic father. His father, that Mr. R. N. Singh, was a very good singer. That also was another aristocratic that aristocrat family—art, some art: painter, singer, poets. Just like Rabindranath Tagore. They became famous as artist. Avanindranatha Thakur, he became famous as artist, and Rabindranath Tagore became... They also followed the aristocratic family, Calcutta. Similarly, this R. N. Singh became a singer. Because they are rich men, they have nothing to do, so... And nobody instructed them how to become saintly person. Simply debauchery and... (break) On the whole the whole human civilization is..., and all the directors, they are not giving chance to know the value of life and how to conduct life. It is the first time, that we are giving the real idea of life. Otherwise whole world is in darkness. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatim. They do not know what is the end of life. Adānta... Matir na kṛṣṇe parataḥ svato vā. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Vyāsadeva's real contribution... Ajānataḥ, lokasyājānato vidvāṁś cakre sātvata-saṁhitām (SB 1.7.6). He has given the right direction. And they are not taking advantage of it. If they come to sense some day, they'll read all these books, and they will come to know how to live life. That is our contribution, Kṛṣṇa consciousness. The whole world plunged into darkness. They do not know what is life and what is the aim of life. That's a fact.

Room Conversation -- April 13, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: No, he's still present. Eight dozens of women, they are residing somewhere.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Training up women for walking around India. Foot race.

Girirāja: In Poona we met one man who was really glorifying you like anything. His name is Dilip Kumar Roy.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Girirāja: He was a famous singer, and his father was also... So now he has become something like a guru. And he has a temple in Poona called the Hare Krishna Temple. And the main Deity is Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa. Of course, he's bogus, more or less, but he... One thing is he was just praising you for hours almost, in front of all of his disciples.

Prabhupāda: How old is he? As old as I am?

Girirāja: He is seventy-five. He was saying that... He's written some sentimental books about Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇa's flute and this and that. But anyway, he was just saying that he couldn't imagine how you could do so much. You know, he said, unless you were empowered by God, you could not have done this. He said with great difficulty he had published one book in America, and you'd published so many books, sales, and making devotees, and establishing centers. He wasn't feeling well, but he said he would really like to come here and offer...

Prabhupāda: Bombay?