Treasures from the deep jungle

I have dedicated my entire life to music for which I have always worked hard and focussed. It is very hard to use music as a financially prosperous path in life, so, at one point I was about to take a commercial job, working in a field that did not resonate with my passions in life. Me and my danish partner had tickets to fly to Spain to settle there and work, but one morning, a week before leaving, she told me out of the blue that I should start making flutes instead, for me it was very surprising, as if she was giving a message for me to keep fighting and working harder to stay in my path in music. I made the first flute the same day, out of a small piece of bamboo from a garden in Denmark, it came out tiny and crooked, but with this simple musical instrument I could play my beloved Indian Music. After this first attempt I knew I had found a passion and a direction I could follow with full integrity, so we decided to cancel our tickets to Spain and travel back to India, this time in search of bamboo to start my journey as a Bansuri flute maker. I had heard that most flutes are made from Assam bamboo, but since I wanted to travel south I decided to explore the options of using bamboo found in South India. Bamboo is such a generous gift from nature that comes in many forms, shapes and sizes. But only very few special species can be used to make a Bansuri. On my first trip to Tamil Nadu I got very excited when I saw some bamboo with long internotes and at first sight they seemed very straight. After cutting the dry bamboo, I realised all the pieces were slightly bend. To find the real Bansuri bamboo it took me on an adventure in the mountains and jungles of beautiful Kerala, I had to search for some time and connect with the local tribes and local musicians sharing music and knowledge. We ventures into the deep jungle to hand select mature pieces of perfect bamboo.

This bamboo is only found in the deep rainforest, it can only grow to be so straight in a place where there are big trees to lean on, so the struggle to reach out its leaves between the high trees, makes the internodes long and completely straight. The jungle is protected, and non-tribal people can’t normally go into these magic areas. The bamboo is part of the jungles natural diversity, and we are lucky to be able to cut down some mature bamboo pieces, still leaving plenty behind. I felt very blessed to start my flute making journey working with this special bamboo and connecting with the beautiful people of Kerala. During the following year I also travelled to North India, where I found a source for Assam bamboo. This bamboo is from the jungles of northeast India, where the bamboo also has perfect conditions to be crafted into perfect flutes. I always felt that playing Bansuri gave me a direct connection to nature. I feel it even stronger since I started making flutes. Sharing this connection with people all over the world. In it’s essence music is nature, the sound vibration and frequency. To be able to explore this through a vessel of organic bamboo has become my truest passion.