Singing along at concerts isn't generally acceptable behavior. But with kirtan, it's a given. Even shy voices can find a place in the call-and-response patterns of this increasingly popular style of Indian devotional music, says Jai Uttal, who will perform Sunday at Raleigh's Long View Center.

"Singing is scary to people," Uttal says. "Not all people, but a lot of people are very unused to singing. Even still, I urge them, because what a cool thing it is to go past their comfort zones and their fears."

Uttal, 57, is an American musician who has released more than a dozen kirtan CDs that incorporate sounds from R&B to banjo and electronica. He discussed his music in a phone interview from his Northern California home.

On approaching kirtan: "Religious belief couldn't be less important. What is most important, and in some ways solely important, is a wanting and a willingness to journey into our own beings, our own souls, our own hearts and find a way to heal all the stuff inside of us and express it and release it and connect it to something greater than ourselves, whether we call that nature or spirit or just community.

"And what we actually believe with our minds, I'm not saying that's not important in life; of course it's important. But in this practice of kirtan, it's not important. It's solely about the heart and the feelings and the emotions, the greater feelings, the feelings that take us beyond ordinary feelings."

On religion: "I would say I have a very, very deep spiritual faith in the goodness and benevolence of the universe and God's presence and protection and my guru's presence and guru's protection. I wouldn't say I'm an actual Hindu. And I was raised in the Jewish tradition, and I still feel like a Jew, but I'm not very much practicing it. So I guess I'd have to say it's much more of a spiritual lifestyle than a religious lifestyle."

On composing kirtan: "There's a lot of parameters in terms of the words and how the words are combined and how the words are pronounced, the mantras themselves. ... One of the really interesting and cool things about the practice of kirtan is that it can be done with any melody. ... But the words themselves are ancient, ancient, ancient, and they are not to be messed around with."

On taking kirtan home: "It's really cool, when famous singers come to town, to hear them and sing with them. And I want everybody to come sing with me when I come to Raleigh. But the practice itself really takes on its life when someone does it on their own or with their loved ones or with their close friends, or just as an intimate conversation with God, with the Spirit. Then, coming together as a group, each person has a lot more to offer to the whole stew."

On semantics: "When I lead a kirtan, whether it's a small group, a big group or whatever, I always introduce the words and tell what they mean. And almost all the kirtan singers I know do that as well. ... There are some mantras that I like to use a lot: 'Sri Ram jai Ram jai jai Ram,' which basically means, 'Victory to God and to the eternal consort of God who is the goddess,' something like that. And mostly they all mean, 'Praise, hallelujah, God, Goddess, God, Goddess, God, Goddess.' Other than that, it gets too detailed. There are so many layers of understanding of the words, and all of the layers are true and all of them are rich and all of them are amazing."

On singing along: "Kirtan is really about group singing. And because of the repetition, if you're not singing along, it could get a little boring.

"I do use a lot of melodic variations and tempo variations and musical variations. But still, it's about repetition. And part of the practice, the amazing part of the practice, is that it's repetition, over and over again. And that's part of how it works on our souls, on our spirits, on our beings. That repetition takes us into deeper and deeper places. It's not dull. A lot of it is very, very lively, very high energy. A lot of people dance. But the mantras are repeated over and over and over again, and sometimes it's very quiet and calm and peaceful, and sometimes it's very hyper-intense. But it's still repetition. And that's important."

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