John Kolessar
Hebrew Ragas
© 2001 Kolessar Productions
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Middle Eastern / Hebrew / East Indian This album merges the rich musical traditions of Israel and India, creating an unique and haunting sound by placing Hebrew melodies within the East Indian musical structure.
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About the Artist:
John Kolessar is an Orthodox Seventh-Day Adventist Christian. His goal is to glorify God, and edify people with His music. The purpose of his music is to bring people into a closer and deeper relationship with God. Orthodox Seventh-Day Adventists believe in obeying God fully by following the example of Jesus Christ, and His Disciples. This includes keeping the Sabbath from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday, keeping all the Biblical Holydays, such as Passover, and all the other Holy Laws that God gave us in the Bible. Jesus said "If you love Me, keep My Laws." (John 14:15) The most important feature of their faith is their sole dependance upon Jesus Christ to give them the ablility to overcome sin and to live the life that God want's us to live, and to strive to be truely like Christ, and to love God with all of our heart, soul, and might.
John's main instrument is the Sitar, a stringed instrument from India. Even though the instrument is from India, due to the Babylonian, and subsequent Medo-Persian captivity, the sitar was brought back to Jerusalem with the Jews and was played in the Temple during the 2nd Commonwealth, during the time of Jesus. He also plays the Oud and Lute, which were used in one form or another in both the 1st and 2nd Temples. His music ministry incorporates music from different time periods of Israel's history on various instruments.
Since 1994, John Kolessar has studied the history, theory, and practice of the music and religion of Israel, as well as the surrounding cultures. His main focus of study is the liturgy of the Jews and Christians in Palestine during the 1st century CE.
John Kolessar has been blessed with the opportunities to do concerts and lectures at various schools, churches, synagogues, temples, and universities throughout the country. He has also scored and performed the music for the theatrical production "The Gospel of Mark" in various cites.
With the goal of glorifying God and edifying people, he is always looking for the opportunity to bless others with his ministry by enriching them through both word and music.
About the CD:
The goal of this album is to merge together the rich musical traditions of Israel and India. Many of the Indian ragas were created by taking the melodies that the Hindus sang in their prayers to their multiple dieities and setting them to the structure and format of the ragas. What has been done here is that the beautiful melodies that the Hebrews sang to God in their prayers have been set to the raga structure and format. Even though the age of some of these melodies are very ancient, they are still used to this day in the liturgy of both Jews and Orthodox Seventh-Day Adventist.