Photos by Kat Mills I met Puja whilst on opposite sides of a camera. I was working as an art director, and he was part of a series of headshots I was doing. During that shoot, I was doing a lot of talking with the subjects—you know… a make-em-comfortable sort of banter. But I was really struck when talking to Puja. Really, I didn’t want the next person scheduled to step in! He had this sense of being both rooted in the ages and flying towards the future. We had since kept in touch over social media, me in NYC and him in LA, and I recently reached out to chat about his new kirtan album, hand poke tattoos, and embodying the mother goddess. Ryan LeMere: Tell me, are you still working on this album?Puja Singh Titchkosky: Well, actually, it’s done! It’s called Heart Full of Light. It was a very fast process. I started chanting for different classes, and people kept asking if I have something recorded. It was always, “No, not really, but eventually I’ll do something.” And then I had connected with this producer, who had come to a workshop I was chanting for, and within six weeks I had made the album and it was out. RL: I just feel like it wasn’t long ago you were posting about recording it, and so I’m shocked you sent me a final link…that it already exists! PST: I think my naivete going into it was a strength… RL: Can you tell me how your upbringing and your family are present in this work? PST: Well my mom is from India, born in Delhi, and her family is Punjabi, Sikh. So I grew up hearing kirtan on CD’s in the house, and also at Sikh temples, hearing kirtan live. My dad’s family was Christian so we went to Christian church as well. The music and devotion from a very young age has just carried through until now. I’ve been chanting with this harmonium I had since I was a child – I was born in Canada – and when we moved from Canada I thought the harmonium got lost in the move. But recently I learned it was at my grandpa’s house, in the closet. So I went and got it, which was around when I was doing my 200hr yoga teacher training. We were chanting in that training, which is how I was introduced to how we do it here in the west. Photo credit: Kat Mills RL: Did the chanting then disappear for you at any point? It sounds like you had a moment of reintroduction. PSJ: The devotional aspect of it was always there, but it had morphed itself. Throughout my life I’ve always gone to temple with my family. And when I was was 18, I got really into Christianity, going to two different churches. Every once in a while my family has done it in the home, too. It’s always been around, but for me to actually incorporate it as one of my own practices has been newer in the past couple of years. RL: I was actually surprised at how traditional this was. Your previous album What Am I 2 U? was a very different tone. You have songs like “Ca$Hoe$”. What’s the relationship here? PSJ: My mom and her family are like somewhat traditional, but I’ve also grown up being this weird queer punk-ish kind of kid in my own way. I’ve always been really into pop music. When I was young, I thought I would be a pop star. Once I found kirtan, and started chanting for people, the response that I got was so wild to me. I never expected it. It was this connection that I made. This overlap of my love of music but also my devotion to God and to life coming together in this beautiful way. “My mom and her family are like somewhat traditional, but I’ve also grown up being this weird queer punk-ish kind of kid in my own way.” RL: The other thing I was thinking was that this type of music is quite healing. And the hand poking that you do is—I think you also mention that as a healing exercise. And possibly even as direct healing modalities? PST: Yeah it’s interesting because I hear what you’re saying in that I don’t think of them as direct healing modalities, but the reason I started thinking of them more that way was because that’s what people were telling me. I would constantly get people after I tattooed them or after I chant for them, saying, “Wow, I feel like that was so healing.” I kept hearing that reiterated in different ways. And then I really started to bring more awareness to that aspect of it. Photo credit: Kat Mills I thought I’d be teaching more asana, and if I continued doing music, I thought it’d be in a pop realm. Like I said, it makes perfect sense that it’s come about. Even with tattooing, I have this really intense fear of needles, so it’s a surprise. RL: How do you tattoo or get tattooed with a fear of needles? PST: Umm.. haha, I just go into this other headspace. And this is why I thought I could handle something like acupuncture, because I imagined it being more similar to the experience of tattooing than getting a shot, but I couldn’t… nothing has happened in this life that has triggered it so I am convinced… RL: Past life. PST: Yeah, it’s a past life thing. “I want to take care of them and heal them and cocoon them and hold this space for them where they can maybe explore something about themselves.” RL: Can you talk a little bit more about this head space that you go into when you’re chanting or poking? PST: It’s an unexplainable, but very natural thing. The times where I try too hard or do it on command, I can’t necessarily quite get there. It just happens when it happens. With chanting, there’s something about these words and this music specifically and sitting with the harmonium. The harmonimum has such an Om-like sound. That in itself takes me to this other place. It’s such a sense of slowness and freedom. With the tattooing, I love taking care of people. And it’s this weird thing where I’m like intentionally hurting them, but they’re like intentionally asking to be hurt for this specific ritualistic reason. So to share that experience and be able to take care of someone through that, I just take on this mother goddess aspect. I want to take care of them and heal them and cocoon them and hold this space for them where they can maybe explore something about themselves, or an aspect about themselves that they’re not able to in other spaces. Photo credit: Kat Mills RL: And does that aspect show up in the album as well? PST: Yeah, I think in more subtle ways. Most of the chants are to more masculine entities. But especially in Sita Ram…Sita’s devotion to Ram, in this romantic way, still has that same devotion and love that I feel and try to express as mother goddess as well. And especially in the cello, for example. That is such a strong, mother goddess tone! RL: What are your thoughts on keeping certain rituals pure and unchanged, versus adapting your traditions to suit our current climates. PST: That is actually what I have been spending a lot of time thinking about lately.˛I’ve always been very drawn to this traditional, spiritual aspect– and religion. And especially coming from both an Eastern and Western family, traditional rituals and practices, and the importance of carrying them forward, are really important for me. They have been so revered and so powerful, and so secretive for so long, because there is so much power in them, (and I think it can be abused in certain ways)– but I think with the advent of technology and everything becoming so accessible now, if I know certain traditional practices and keep them hidden, other people are most likely going to get ahold of that information anyway. A lot of things are westernized and modernized in ways that I don’t agree with. So am I really doing good? RL: I hear you. I also feel like I’m such a purist in many ways. PST: These things are “traditional” for a reason. They’re not some religious fad or something. There’s science and history to them. The thing for me is… I’m trying to find the line or boundary in upholding and carrying on traditions but also bringing them into a contemporary setting. Like you said, we’re living a new age. We can’t do certain practices in the same way a sadhu was doing them 100, 500, or 1,000 years ago. It’s not possible, nor relevant. Still, there should be more reverence for some of these things. Practices (like pranayama, for example) are sometimes just thrown around so much that it seems like they’ve lost their real power. But they haven’t lost their power! I think there’s a lot of people that are getting into these practices through these more accessible means, but there’s certain things I’ve learned that are held with such reverence in other parts of the world or in the yoga community. RL: I think you’re expressing that beautifully. What are you hoping to do in the future with this album? Or what work do you have your sights set on? PST: I would love to keep chanting and sharing this because since I’ve started sharing it with other people, it’s a really powerful practice. And in it, you get to see a side of people you wouldn’t normally get to see, since a big part of it is surrender. You really see the walls come down. I would love to take it far and wide, whatever that means. It’s been so cool making this album because I’ve gotten to connect with other musicians, each with their own lives and practices and dreams that they’re bringing to this, and their own sense of devotion. It’s theirs as much as it’s mine. I just want to keep spreading it to as many people as I can, as many people who would connect with it. Find out more about Puja’s handpoke work and listen to his latest album, Heart Full of Light through his website, iTunes, and Spotify.
