NEW MUSIC REVIEW: “Raw, disciplined ‘aching’ wildness like a spontaneously sacred rāga”: A musician’s review of new song “Playing in the Blissful Lotus-Heart (Karmapa Khyenno)” ( Adele Tomlin/Dakini Songs)
“What struck me most in this piece is how it moves like a sacred raga — anchored in structure, yet travelling freely through emotion, memory, and intuition. There’s a disciplined wildness to it: raw, exposed, and yet somehow architectural. The voice doesn’t just sing — it bears witness.”
These days, my work and creations are getting the “poetic and creative juices” flowing in others. Here is an eloquent, profound and lyrical short review sent to me by a new reader and admirer of my work (who is also a musician) a few days ago, I wanted to share the inspiration here too.
Review of Playing in the Blissful Lotus-Heart (April 2024)
“Playing in the Blissful Lotus-Heart (Karmapa Khyenno)” (by Adele Tomlin/Dakini Songs) is not a performance. It is an offering. From the very first breath, it unfolds with a sincerity that arrests you — not with force, but with unmistakable presence.
As a lifelong musician and teacher, I’ve spent decades listening for that rare alchemy where intention, feeling, and sound move as one. Adele’s voice — textured, intimate, and emotionally precise — carries that alchemy. The layers are beautifully placed, never crowding, never hiding. What’s “naked” is not the tone, but the truth behind it.
The musical composition is both modern and timeless — hand drums and ambient textures create a wide, clear field where the voice can rise and fall, shift and shimmer, without losing its centre. It feels at times like the pulse of sacred ground.
What struck me first — as a listener and musician — was how she respected a structural foundation, a kind of anchor or root, while also allowing her voice to move intuitively around and within it. This balance gives the piece a sense of trust — the listener is guided, not lost, even as we are taken through emotional terrains that are anything but predictable.
What struck me most in this piece is how it moves like a sacred rāga — anchored in structure, yet travelling freely through emotion, memory, and intuition. Adele uses a basic return structure as an anchor for what is otherwise an intuitive unfolding — guided not by performance, but by inner necessity. There’s a disciplined wildness in it — and it’s rare. Raw, exposed, and yet somehow architectural. The voice doesn’t just sing — it bears witness.
There’s a journey embedded in the form — one of longing, loss, surrender, and emergence. The dynamics rise from vulnerability to power, from soft invocation to insistent, rising light. And still, nothing is over-polished. That’s what makes it real.
The sampled backing track by Malte Marten (Lotus Unfolding (2021)) is beautifully chosen. The hand percussion and ambient electronic textures create an atmosphere that lifts but does not weigh down. It lets the voice lead. And what she has done vocally — from the mantra-like invocation “Karmapa Khyenno” to the whispered grief — flows like an emotional arc, a voyage, a soul quietly revealing its states.
That sense of progression across time — from quiet reflection to longing, to intensity, to surrender — gives the song narrative weight. In Dharma, as you know, the listener seeks not only sound but truth that travels. She has achieved that here.
And what’s especially important — and what I love — is that the song could be reduced to its barest essence (just her voice and one melodic thread), and it would still hold all its emotional force. That tells me the piece is not built on decoration — it’s carried by intention. And when that intention is real — perhaps even realised — the spontaneity becomes sacred.
Of course, preparing the ground is part of the work too. Structuring dynamic ranges, anchoring with key words, tuning the voice into a state where it can sing through the sound — all of that deepens the container without stiffening the message. She clearly knows that instinctively.
In short, this music is very much Adele. Honest. Searching. Layered. And beautiful.
“The voice remembers the silence it came from, and sings from that remembering.”
As someone who has walked the Dharma path — imperfectly, yet persistently — for over three decades, I felt the sacred thread running through this song. It’s not a song that seeks validation. It’s a song that speaks from realization-in-process — never complete, but honest. There is fierce tenderness in that.
Adele’s offering feels like part prayer, part transmission. And like all true art, it invites not admiration, but participation. To borrow her own words:
“The heart always sees you. It always knows you. Karmapa Khyenno.”
Adele Tomlin vocalist and composer of Playing in the Blissful Lotus-Heart. For more about Adele’s work and creations, see: https://adeletomlin.com
The track is available to listen to audio only one streaming music channels like Spotify and others. It can also be purchased as a download (and support me the vocalist/composer) on bandcamp.com here.
