Thomas Barquee's The Sound of Om, on Spirit Voyage Music, is his newest release and an exciting new direction for this World Music artist.

Comprised of seven Sanskrit chants, The Sound of Om resonates with depth and passion. The simple, ancient chants form the core of the recording, which is layered with an elaborate, exotic, and effective blend of Indian and Western instrumentation: bansuri, sarod, esraj, and santoor give equal time to keyboards, drums, percussion and bass, as well as electric and acoustic guitar. In less talented hands the result of this may have been disjointed, but Barquee's music is smooth and cohesive,creating an exultant, melodious world.

The simplicity of the chants on this recording enables you to easily join in. "Chanting the mantra is the most intimate experience you can have of them because you get pulled into the energy field of the chants." says Barquee. "These mantras are universal, they reach beyond language and embrace all religions. They express love, wisdomand joy."

An artist of uncommon sensitivity, depth, and breadth, Barquee created modern melodies that seem uniquely well-suited to the ancient mantras. Composing the music, Barquee felt guided by the mantra and experienced a strong synergy between the mantra and the music.

In making The Sound of Om, Barquee traveled to Calcutta to record with some of the greatest living Indian musicians. This lends a rare authenticity to such a diverse recording. "The Indian people were very generous and talented. They encouraged me to follow my intuition," remembers Barquee. "After recording various classical Indian instruments I returned to Los Angeles to add a Western flavor."
"I feel lucky about this album and that is one of the reasons why we’re adding a Lakshmi statue on the back of the cover," continues Barquee. "It is a blessing to be working with such talented and dedicated people and I am well aware of the team effort."

Great music of any genre draws you into an experience of your own depth, to an exultation of the Divine or both. This is especially true of sacred music of all religions and spiritual traditions.

Now, Thomas Barquee, an artist of uncommon sensitivity, has woven a profoundly moving tapestry of Indian, Middle Eastern and Western musical elements, with Latin choral overtones, onto the form of the Catholic Mass. Missa (mass in Latin) is an experience of world church. It transforms this holy structure into a serious and reverential modern musical journey.

As our world continues to shrink, assuming more of the characteristics of a global village, music that crosses the boundaries of different genres, blending elements of East and West, North and South, gains an ever greater audience. The expanding interest in spiritual matters - especially Eastern spirituality -- attracts a larger audience for music with a sacred or inspirational theme. Missa nourishes this need.

Missa combines Eastern and Western approaches to life and spirituality. Its lyrics are drawn from the Roman Catholic service, as well as ancient Sanskrit texts and inspired by the wisdom of Kahlil Gibran, Rumi, the Bhagavad Gita, the Holy Bible and other immortal words. The result showcases Thomas Barquee's great skill as both composer and vocalist.

A call for peace, Missa seeks to tear down barriers between us, allowing emotional commonalties to emerge. The work uses our religious diversity as a vehicle to express human unity, transcending the limitations of individual spiritual and musical traditions. It is this desire to express unity that is the hallmark of Barquee's work.

Missa follows Barquee's previous World-inspired album, Temple, released in 2000 on Hearts of Space Records. A more Eastern-influenced work, Temple was the precursor for the more elaborate canvas Barquee used to create Missa. Barquee, who sees himself as both a composer and vocalist, wanted Missa to be a fuller integration of vocals and music than Temple, a more explicit blending of sacred text with crossover composition.

"Temple is the result of my desire to create a sanctuary," Thomas explains, "a place where I can shut off the negative side of the mind, where renewal and meditation can occur. It's also my way of engineering 'time travel' into my music. If you allow yourself to enter this space, you will lose track of time and lose what could be termed 'time pressure' or stress. I was trying to look inside and find something that was true for myself with these pieces, something that empowers me. I think that the more you allow yourself to go inside, the more power you can develop. It ís ultimately true for everybody."

Temple was recorded in Thomas' own studio and in various studios around Los Angeles. Initially, guitar and bass parts were provided by outside musicians, but Thomas later replaced them with his own performances in a quest for what he describes as a "stripped-down, personal feel" retaining only the percussion parts played by film composer Steve Gurevitch and Daniel Rossman. To this extent, Temple is more of a personal essay than a conventional music recording.

The tracks comprising Temple were created, by Thomas' own admission, ìn a state of trance. He wrote and recorded these pieces without anticipating the results, experimenting first with setting lyrics in different languages to music, then with Sufi poetry as his inspiration. Finally, Thomas chose elemental sounds - basic syllables and consonant and vowel sounds that suited his voice and built the lyrics outward from these small generative kernels of language. "I wanted to get in touch with aspects of inner life that linear thought and language might inhibit. It was important for this music to possess the feeling of how a language might evolve. Of course," Thomas laughs, "It would have been much easier if someone had just given me the words."

This soothing and healing CD contains music compiled specifically to help people in times of grief and loss. The music gently carries listeners to a place where they can begin to feel acceptance, forgiveness and hope.

The CD opens and closes with Ashana's soaring angelic vocals, haunting original melodies and healing crystal bowls. Snatam Kaur's rich and ethereal voice dances over two beautiful healing chants meant to provide inner healing and an experience of deep love. Thomas Barquee's artistry flows through this entire compilation, and on his own tracks he draws listeners into an experience of deep nourishment of the self and an exultation of the Divine.