Interview: Kelli Scarr ~ The Unexpected Healing!

Kelli tells a beautiful story about reconciliation and healing this time-and it has to do with her time traveling with the artist Moby...and being a new mother. Suffice it to say, she was conflicted about that time and how she was present to her son, and then something magical happened!

Transcript

Greetings everyone.

I think it is really appropriate that I'm releasing my conversation with Kelly Scar the day before the solstice because Kelly is involved in some really groovy work that has to do with myth,

With magic,

And with caves,

And with music as well.

Now I'm going to be using a little bit from Wikipedia as well as a little bit from Kelly's own website to introduce her.

So from Wikipedia,

Kelly Scar is an Emmy-nominated composer,

Producer,

Multi-instrumentalist,

And singer.

She was featured on Moby's album,

Wait For Me,

And collaborated with him on National Public Radio's Project Song,

Resulting in the track Gone to Sleep.

And also,

Fun fact,

Kelly was nominated for an Emmy Award for her work on the HBO documentary In a Dream.

And I am here to tell you that she has the most incredible voice.

She does a little bit of singing in this episode.

I frankly wished we could have talked for about two or three hours because our conversation was just so great.

So now from her website,

Kelly is doing some really incredible work in the world.

Just this year,

She unveiled Greater Mysteries,

Which is an immersive album and performance experience that draws on timeless mythic journeys to the underworld.

And we do talk about that process and how Kelly is creating this really interesting intersection between,

Well,

What I consider to be dreaming,

Myth,

Imagination,

Belonging to the underworld,

The unconscious,

The subconscious,

Music,

Art.

I imagine dance as well.

And yeah,

She had an event this year that took place in a cave.

And I am telling her that I'm going to this event next year because it looks and sounds just phenomenal.

We talk about how she ended up where she is today,

But she was raised in Northern California and her musical journey began in church.

And that led her to Berkeley College of Music before she settled in New York City.

She's done a ton of different kinds of projects from fronting the bands Moonraker and Salt and Sambovar to a significant collaboration,

Writing,

Recording,

And touring with Moby,

As I stated before.

She's also composed music for dozens of films,

TV shows,

And commercials.

But yeah,

For me,

The most exciting thing was this project that she's working on called Greater Mysteries.

So now without further ado,

Here's my conversation with the incredibly talented and very gracious Kelly Scarr.

So I joined Moby's band and I was like playing keys and I was singing and I was like having the time of my life,

Like flying in private planes,

Staying in five-star hotels,

Like getting room service.

Yeah.

Until they shut that all down.

But like,

Yeah,

It was a really good ride.

And it was also really challenging because I was a mom.

And at the time my son was two.

If you had to,

Well,

I mean,

You have gotten on a stage.

I always say,

If you get on a stage,

But you've been on a stage,

But you know,

Maybe if you're at a party and you're in a group and someone says,

Well,

Who are you?

What do you do?

What's your life like?

How would you,

How would you answer that question?

Okay.

So I have my answer and then I have a caveat.

So,

So the answer would be that I'm an artist.

I'm a singer.

I'm a mother.

I'm a sister.

I'm a friend.

I'm a lover.

I'm a daughter.

I'm like all of those things.

And I would also say like more and more I recognize or I identify as a disciple of the mystery and the goddess and all of the complexity that is in that realm.

Simultaneously,

I would say my caveat is that I feel like I'm in a really liminal place right now.

And,

You know,

Coming out of a really intense creativity cycle for the past four years.

And I'm,

I'm definitely like,

I feel like I'm at,

I'm like between stories of like who I am and how I would describe myself and what it is that I do.

So that's all,

That's the messy truth.

Oh my gosh.

I love that.

I love the liminal space.

I say,

I love so much on this podcast because so many people are doing such cool things out in the world.

But that liminal space can be very scary,

But it also can be the place where everything comes from.

It's this place where you feel off kilter and there's no solid ground underneath you.

And you kind of have to figure out,

You know,

For me,

I'm like,

I like this place.

I feel intoxicated.

It's just so exciting.

But eventually you do have to leave.

Right.

Yeah.

So please,

You're a musician.

You have all sorts of just incredible music on YouTube.

You're a composer.

You're an artist.

When you were a kid,

Were you like,

This is what I'm going to do?

Um,

Yeah,

It was pretty clear early on.

Um,

I started singing before I was really speaking and it was,

Um,

It happened through my relationship with my grandmother,

Who was one of my primary caretakers when I was young.

And,

Um,

So I spent a lot of time with her and she,

And I would sing together and we would sing spirituals.

Yeah.

I have cassette tapes from when I was like two years old of us like doing duets.

Yeah.

Two and three that are just really,

I'm so glad that she even thought to record that was back before,

You know,

We were documenting everything and somehow Nana knew that I would need those tapes.

Um,

Yeah.

So it started there and like,

Uh,

My family,

I,

I was,

I'm assuming we would get to this anyways,

But my family was pretty religious when I was growing up.

I grew up in a Lutheran household.

Um,

We were definitely like a church every Sunday kind of family.

And it was really through first with,

You know,

Singing at home with my grandma.

And then when I joined the church choir and that that became like kind of a part of my,

My life rhythm was just like singing,

Um,

And singing in groups and then,

Singing as a soloist.

Um,

And then I would say in terms of like,

When I decided to really pursue it as my vocation,

Um,

That happened in high school.

Um,

My mom,

You know,

It was one of the,

The beautiful moments of synchronicity,

Which I consider a moment of magic in my life was my mom moved us to Folsom,

California that to the head of high school that happened to have like the best jazz choir in the nation.

Um,

Like year after year,

They would like win this competition at the Monterey jazz festival.

And,

And I went to school there,

You know?

And so then I got like totally swept up in the world of jazz and choir singing still.

Um,

And then when we,

We toured Europe when I was 16,

Yeah.

And I played at like Montreux jazz festival,

North sea jazz festival,

Got to live with like a host family in Germany.

I mean,

Yeah,

It's like stuff that you just can't ever,

It's like beyond my wildest dreams.

And it was in that experience and like performing on stage where I was like,

Oh,

This is what I want to do.

And then,

Yeah,

I applied to music school and the rest is history.

Let me ask you when you,

I don't know if you rediscovered those tapes of you and your grandmother singing,

Did it?

I mean,

I can imagine that was a pretty powerful moment,

Um,

But also like a moment that recalled you to yourself,

Your younger self that already knew who you were going to become.

Did it feel like that?

Um,

I mean,

I would say like less so in terms of like knowing I was going to be a quote singer.

I mean,

Cause I also have like issues with that,

Which we can get into if you want,

But like more like that,

It reminded me that my grandmother was like cultivating my relationship with the divine from an early age.

And it was like through singing that music where I'm singing,

I love you Lord singing.

I love you.

You know,

It's like,

I'm doing that at two and three.

Like,

So I'm,

It's being imprinted in my mind that there is something greater out there that we can commune with through our voice.

And I think,

Oh,

I'm getting the chills talking about it.

Yeah.

I think it was like being put in that,

Being gifted that,

That conversation through,

Through voice at such a young age was more what was kind of like revelatory for me in,

In finding those tapes.

You know,

I've always thought that the universe is just one big song that it's an emanation,

You know,

And it's an eternal emanation from where I cannot say,

But you know,

Even consciousness,

I think is a song.

And it's interesting.

I had my,

She doesn't call herself a medicine worker,

But the woman I go to see here and work with,

She had me when she was mentoring me,

Create a mind palace.

So I could go in and bring in,

You know,

A place where I could meet with the helpers that wanted to work with me,

My spirit guides,

Archetypes that wanted to show up for me.

And it was fascinating.

It was so fascinating.

It was deep red,

Blood red,

There are banquets all over the place.

There's fire.

But in the corner,

There's a long,

And I don't know where this came from,

A long rectangular space that is lit from below,

Where there is a spring eternally bubbling up through rocks.

And she,

You know,

She's like,

What is there?

And I told her that.

And I was like,

Where did that come from?

I have in every time I go to the mind palace,

The spring is still there.

And I,

I thought to myself,

I know what this is.

This is the unfurling of the universe.

It's the,

It's that endless song that's bubbling up,

Letting me know that it's eternal,

And it will always be here.

And somehow it found its way into my mind palace.

But there's so much comfort when I go in there.

And I,

I see that it's still there,

It's still flowing.

But I've come to understand it.

That is the language or the image that my,

My very,

I would say,

Simple human brain uses to actually represent something that's much,

Much larger than me.

So yes,

Song,

Music,

I think it's what creates everything.

Yeah,

Yeah,

That's one of my first tattoo is actually not a Brahma,

Which in Sanskrit is goddess sound.

Oh,

My God.

Yeah,

Beautiful.

Yeah.

Let me ask you,

When you were a kid?

Did you I mean,

I've asked this question so many in the top answer is asked or not.

So I'm just gonna put that out there.

Okay.

Yeah.

But in your singing songs to the Lord,

You know,

This is a two part question,

Actually.

Which is very male,

Right?

It's very masculine,

Patriarchal.

But before we started kind of the podcast,

You alluded to the goddess.

So I'd love to hear about that journey.

That really,

Really intrigues me.

I would also,

You know,

I want all my listeners to know about this.

For me,

Okay,

This epic event you just had in caves in New York,

With music.

Okay,

So I don't know,

This is sort of a weird disjointed two part question,

Because you're doing this work bringing this transformative,

Gorgeous,

Evocative music into places like caves where,

You know,

I don't know,

I've always thought of caves as places where things can be birthed.

And where,

You know,

We,

I know we originally climbed out of the mud and the muck or what have you,

But I don't know,

I've always fantasized about living in a cave,

I kind of think it would be comfortable.

So here you are doing this unbelievable event in a cave in New York,

Which everyone should go to next year.

Did you ever think as a kid,

You'd be in a cave?

Doing this work?

Um,

I mean,

No.

And,

You know,

I always think I think Steve Jobs said something about this,

Like,

You can't connect the dots going forward,

You can only connect them when you look back.

So it's like,

Looking back now,

It makes perfect sense that I've,

I've ended up where I am now,

Which is like,

Exclusively playing in caves.

But I would say,

Like,

It,

It's a combination of my religious upbringing,

And,

And really identifying that there are aspects of church and religion,

It's like that we shouldn't be throwing out with the bathwater,

You know,

So to speak,

Like,

Which is ritual,

Music,

Community mystery,

That's it to me.

So I think like this whole time,

As I got older,

And stopped going to church and stopped identifying as being like a religious person,

I've,

I've,

I've held this sense of longing inside me to find a way to unite those forms again,

In,

You know,

And,

You know,

Simultaneously was like having so many awful experiences playing live music,

Which is like a whole other topic,

You know,

Which all led me here to where I was like,

Wait,

I need to be in a position where I can work with other like minded people to make sure every little aspect of the audience and performer experience is taken into consideration,

And that we are all having the best experience possible.

The cave piece,

I think,

You know,

When I was young,

We used to go to the Sierra Nevadas,

This area called Miwok Village,

And a typical outing that we would do every summer would be to go to these caves that you could tour.

And I think that that there must have been something in there.

Because from that,

Like,

I've always been interested in caves.

And I'm like,

I think it was just from like,

Having that experience of like going down in a cave,

Summer after summer,

And probably being in a state of awe,

And not really understanding why.

Yeah.

And then now,

Of course,

I can connect the dots with like,

So many things.

But yeah,

I'll stop there.

You don't have to,

I'm sitting here,

Just I'm like,

Oh,

My gosh,

Then I'm thinking of my experiences in caves.

When I walked the Camino,

I spent afterwards,

Three weeks in Cornwall,

Before I took the Queen Mary back to the US.

And I decided in I think it was Newquay to go coasteering,

Which means you put on a wetsuit.

And these strapping young men,

You know,

Who I think are in college,

Take you out onto the cliffs,

And you do all sorts of things like you jump off these really high cliffs,

And you do all these fun things.

Well,

To me,

They were fun for some of the other people when they were like,

I'm really scared.

But one of the things we did,

The tide was out.

Thank God.

But we went into a sea cave.

Wow.

Swimming.

Yeah.

And the kids,

I was like,

Is this you guys are in?

Is this a good?

You must know what you're doing?

Okay,

Right.

Gonna like,

But it was,

You know,

Here you are,

The ceiling is like just a few feet ahead of above you.

And there's no end to the cave that you can see.

And you're just going into this cave and you're in the water.

And I just had this rush of claustrophobia.

Because I was like,

I,

This is a little intense for me.

The other one is I've been to the caves in southern New Mexico.

And I mean,

The cave,

The big cave,

The cave,

You know that,

I mean,

One of the rooms in this cave can fit a jumbo jet.

It's just so massive.

Incredibly beautiful.

There's a reason it's on everyone's tourist,

You know,

List.

But,

But eerie,

Very eerie.

You know,

They have the whole thing lit up.

I also went to Arkansas and drove through Eureka Springs.

And there's a ton of caves down there.

And so I stopped and visited some of the caves.

And it's almost like you're on another planet.

It's it's so hard to describe.

That being said,

I will never be a spelunker.

I will never be someone who goes and investigates the cave because I've read stories about how crazy that is.

But I admire those people.

But there's something just,

I mean,

The cave just like stripped everything away from me.

Yeah,

I was in there.

And I was just I just felt so little.

It felt so small.

But also that I was in the presence of something that was so large,

And I had no words for it.

It was fascinating.

Yeah,

Beautiful.

So I'd love to know,

Okay,

Tell me about this cave event that you had.

Why did you choose that cave?

Okay.

Well,

I feel like in order to get there,

I should probably start at the beginning of the project,

Right,

Which is called greater mysteries.

So I would say back in about 2020 or so,

I was on a call with my I call her my spiritual guidance counselor.

And we're wrapping up our session and she kind of like,

You know,

Throws out I see Greece in your field.

I'm like,

Okay,

And I just,

You know,

I wrote it down in my journal and then just kind of like moved on.

But it kept kind of bubbling to the surface for me.

In the following year,

And I kept thinking about it.

And I was like,

Well,

I've been to Greece before,

Like on tour,

And it definitely was like a really resonant place for me.

But it just didn't feel right to like go on vacation there.

Like I knew that I had to have some kind of purpose.

And so one night I was just I started googling artists residency Greece.

And the first thing that popped up was this residency called the mud house and is in Crete.

And the application was due like the next day or something.

And I was like,

Fuck it,

I'm gonna I'm gonna apply.

So I put my application in and of course,

As you can guess where the story is going,

I get into the residency.

And then,

You know,

That kind of like set the energy in motion for the project,

Just like committing that I was going to go to this place.

And,

You know,

I hadn't very consciously been engaging with myth.

Again,

Now looking back,

I can see actually,

You know,

The the myth that I was most deeply engaged with during childhood was the wizard vase.

And that is a heroine's journey story.

Yeah.

So I've been going down all kinds of wizard of Oz rabbit holes lately.

It's been so fun.

So yeah,

I hadn't been very consciously engaging with myth.

But I knew that because I was going to Crete,

And because I had already started picking up that I wanted to make music that followed the cycle of transformation.

I was like,

There's something here I started.

So I started going down all kinds of rabbit holes about like the goddess and mythology and really got into Maureen Murdoch's book,

The Heroine's Journey.

And she brings up the myth of Inanna in that book.

But it was when I started researching the goddess that I came across Dr.

Svela,

Who you've had on your show.

And she and I started working together in a mentorship capacity.

And let me see,

I'm gonna try to make this concise.

So I go to Crete,

And at this point,

I know,

Again,

That I'm going to be making music that follows the arc of transformation.

But that's kind of all I know.

And I didn't want to put too much pressure on myself.

So I was like,

Okay,

I'm just going to use this residency to compose seeds.

That could be like,

A chorus,

A verse,

It could be both,

It could be longer,

It could,

You know,

I just kind of like left it really open for myself to experiment.

And as I'm there,

And I'm like,

Deepening my studies through my work with Dr.

Svela,

I'm like revisiting her incredible archive of like,

Over a decade of podcasts,

Where she like,

Deep dives into all of these incredible myths.

I'm noticing,

You know,

That there really is this like,

Strong archetypal pattern where we follow,

You know,

What is,

I think,

More commonly now understood as the hero's journey,

But like,

This journey of like,

Hearing a call,

Heading out to the unknown.

And then through that process,

You know,

You make a descent,

And you have to surrender and part of you has to die along the way.

And then,

And with,

And when you know that,

And when you know that it's this thing that everyone does,

Sometimes at multiple times in their life,

Sometimes many cycles happening,

Overlapping,

And you're in different stages in one part of your life than you are on the other.

But when you know that you're doing that,

And that it's part of something greater,

And timeless,

And as and part of nature,

It's a lot easier to kind of surrender when you're like somewhere in in the cycle.

Like I was explaining when we started,

Like,

I'm just like,

Oh,

Here I am.

I'm in the liminal place.

I've been here before.

I've read,

You know.

So I started composing these seeds.

And,

You know,

Because I'm such a creative mind,

And I'm like,

Constantly getting a million ideas,

I like really thrive with like,

Spreadsheets,

Like,

I need things to be very organized in order to like,

Fill my art into them.

So I started this spreadsheet.

I'm telling you the really long,

This is getting longer than I'd hoped.

Is this okay?

Okay.

So I'm filling this spreadsheet with like,

What I identified as like,

The,

You know,

The 12 or so core stages of the cycle of transformation.

Simultaneously,

I'm like,

In talks with a producer slash old friend of mine,

We know we're going to work on this project together.

We've been dreaming into it for years.

And I was finally getting clear on like,

The theme and starting to dabble with the music.

And we start to talk about where we're going to make this music or record it rather.

And,

You know,

Originally,

I'd wanted to record it at the real world Peter Gabriel studio in England and just kept kind of getting like,

Closed doors for various reasons.

And my producer had been invited to go to this brand new studio in Iceland.

And he comes back and he was like,

This is where we have to make the record.

And I was kind of like,

Okay,

Fine.

You know.

So we set off to Iceland,

Which is like a totally mythical place,

You know,

And has lots of,

You know,

Interesting,

Seen and unseen forces,

Very much alive there.

And we,

It's me,

My producer,

Dan,

Who's also playing bass and a drummer named Jeff Lipstein,

And piano player named Sam Kassir.

And we basically like lock ourselves in the studio for 10 days and improvise to the seeds.

Yeah,

Man,

It was like,

If there's like one part I could like,

Go back to,

It would be those days in the studio.

It was just so magical.

And it was so magical to like,

To go with such little certainty.

Like I just had these fragments of songs and just to watch them like unfold or feel them unfold and to be a part of that process and to be doing that as a group together was just so gratifying.

So then,

You know,

We bring the material back to the States and then we're still like adding layers to it.

And we're inviting a bunch of players into the studio.

We're not playing the music for them in advance.

And we're just hitting play and record at the same time.

And they're improvising on top of what we're improvising.

So the whole time,

The whole,

The thing is becoming a being that is very much alive,

The thing being the music.

And of course,

Somewhere along the way,

I start to think like,

Okay,

I really want to play this stuff live.

Like this music just feels like the most potent stuff I've ever made.

And I can't wait to like share that with a live audience and then see how how it gets reinvigorated through that relationship.

And then of course,

My mind goes to where I've played shows before.

And I'm like,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No,

No.

And,

And I knew that I needed to,

As I said earlier,

I think like,

Find the right collaborators to co-create the setting for this music to have the maximum impact.

This is where the cave comes into play.

So where I live in upstate New York,

There's there's a lot of really amazing caves,

Actually.

But there's one in particular that I had been made aware of when I was making my my last record,

Which was called No Rush.

And I had looked at it as a performance,

Possible performance space.

It's technically a mine.

It's called Widow Jane Mine.

It was a cement mine,

You know,

It in the throughout the early early 1800s into mid 1900s.

And so it's technically like rock,

You know,

That's been dug out of a mountain,

But it very much has like the shape of the cave and you're like still making a descent and going into a place and there's like water in there and it's just magical.

So I'd known about this space.

And as I got clear on the vision of like creating a totally unique situation for people to encounter this music,

It just was like a no brainer.

Like I'm like,

Oh,

This is where it has to be.

Yeah.

So I mean,

Yeah,

I'll stop there.

Oh,

No.

I just Wow.

I'm just like,

Wow.

I yeah.

Um,

Let me ask you because I do want to just revisit this before we go too much further.

But I just kind of enamored by the fact that you said we went to Iceland and there are lots of things that are seen and unseen.

Yeah.

And I've always wanted to go to Iceland just to put that out there.

Because I mean,

I bought this book by this incredible author about elves.

Yeah,

Yeah,

In Iceland,

And how for the people there,

They're very real,

And very concrete.

They're out there.

There's no question that they're not alive,

That they don't exist.

Is that the kind of things that you were talking about when you're you're talking about the unseen?

Yeah,

Yeah,

Yeah,

There's like,

There's a full on.

Yeah,

They live in a totally different paradigm there,

Where they like,

What at nighttime,

Like make offerings to the elves before they go to bed,

Just as like a normal thing.

You know,

An alternative to doom scrolling,

Which is what I'm trying to stop doing before I go to bed.

Oh,

Yeah,

Absolutely.

Okay,

So here you are in Iceland,

I think that that energy,

It's kind of a liminal space there.

Iceland seems very liminal to me,

Because you've got volcanoes.

Yeah.

And actually,

The night we were flying out,

The whole country was on alert,

Because this volcano was erupting.

And we thought that we were maybe going to have to cancel the trip,

Or we were also scared that we were going to get stuck there.

So so the energy of the volcano,

Which is like a beautiful symbol of transformation was very alive while we were there.

And just like the magnitude of nature and how not in control we are.

Oh,

Yeah.

You know,

I think we lose.

I mean,

I,

Obviously,

We both live in the states,

But it's,

We lose.

It's the states are so huge.

It's just so much land.

You know,

If there's a volcano like Mount St.

Helens in the 80s,

That erupts,

No one on the East Coast,

It's not going to really,

You know,

Bother them.

But in Iceland,

It's,

I mean,

Those forces are very present.

And the landscape is,

I would always think,

You know,

It's a place where you're never sure that the ground's actually going to be underneath your feet.

And you're in the middle of the ocean.

Yeah,

That too.

I mean,

I have a fantasy,

I do suspect that elves or beings akin to elves actually live all over the whole planet.

Iceland is just this place that has resisted the kind of Western paradigm of forgetting those things or putting them away because they're childish.

And I really respect the people in Iceland for,

For staying with those old beliefs that I,

You know,

We need all the help we can get.

So whether the person is,

You know,

A giant who's 12 feet tall,

Or someone who's a foot tall,

I will take the help.

I'm sorry.

Yeah,

I really.

So let me ask you,

You know,

You have your first event in the cave.

At the end,

Did you just think,

Oh,

My God,

Something really potent happened here?

Yeah.

Today?

Yeah.

Completely humbled.

And still,

Frankly,

In a state of awe right now.

Like it's been,

It was two months ago.

And yeah,

I'm just in complete awe.

Yeah.

I know.

I already told you,

I want to come to next year's.

I really hope you do it.

Some something really indescribable took place.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm guessing.

I mean,

I know you said you're in this liminal space.

You know,

I'm,

I,

If you want to know,

I'm in the place.

Did you read the alchemist?

Yeah.

Okay.

So I'm in the place where you polish the glasses at the tea shop at the top of the hill.

That's where I am.

That's where I've been for about five years.

Yeah.

So I'm interested in this liminal space.

You know,

You say you're in this liminal space.

For me,

I'm like,

This is very exciting.

There's so much that can happen in that space.

It's,

For me,

It's intoxicating to be in a space because there's so much potentiality in there.

Yeah.

When you,

You know,

You were in this incredible studio in Iceland,

This 10 days where you created a whole bunch of magic and it was just amazing.

And then you bring things back,

Everything back to your life in the States.

Did you think to yourself,

All right,

That's it.

I'm done like with this.

Or did you think this is just one step along the road where I'm heading?

Like,

Did I think this is done after the cave shows?

Yeah.

I had this sense of like,

I would be happy if that was all we ever did.

And also,

You know,

Spirit or whatever you want to call it is,

Is I'm,

I'm just waiting to catch the next instruction.

So yeah,

It's not over.

I know for sure.

Yeah.

Like we're,

I'm already,

You know,

With my collaborators talking about,

We ended up so the,

The cave shows happened in the fall,

Around fall equinox.

And in spring we had done a run of previews to kind of like test the ritual component of the thing.

And we did it at a more traditional venue,

But working with an incredible local artist here named Amanda Russo-Rubman,

She transformed the venue into a cave.

She like installed this whole magical art piece.

So we had already tested it and,

And under,

Under the name of Lesser Mysteries,

Because this is all inspired by,

I don't know if you're familiar with the Eleusinian Mysteries of Greece.

Yes.

A little familiar.

Yeah.

So this is where the name comes from.

And I'll just share briefly the Eleusinian Mysteries were an initiation,

Right.

That took place over thousands of years in ancient Greece whereby,

You know,

Thousands of people at a time would make a pilgrimage from Athens to Eleusis on foot,

Which is approximately 12 miles.

And they would go into this cave like setting.

And,

You know,

Exactly what happened isn't totally clear because the initiates were sworn to secrecy that was punishable by death.

But it is now,

You know,

Through tons of scholarship that's been going on for decades now,

It's,

It's known that psychedelics were likely involved.

It is also known that there was some sort of reenactment of the Demeter and Persephone myth,

Which is an underworld journey.

So I'll just say when I was like researching the cave thing and the performance,

The Eleusinian Mysteries came,

Came online for me and just was like another area where I felt so lit up and inspired and like filled with the question,

What does it look like to create an Eleusinian Mysteries for 2025 in the Hudson Valley?

Okay.

So this is where I get the name from.

Greater Mysteries is the fall version,

Lesser Mysteries is the spring.

I give you this backstory because we're already,

Dr.

Tvela and I are actually doing a winter program called Winter Mysteries.

That's going to be on December 18th and it's online.

And we're now planning for the next round of Lesser Mysteries,

Which will happen around spring equinox under the theme probably likely of like emergence and with the intention of like getting ready to be ready for the fall,

The fall gathering.

So yeah,

It's not over,

But I'm,

I'm really with,

You know,

I'm really noticing,

You know,

Our culture of course has these like kind of like concrete pressures of like growing and expanding and reaching more people and do,

You know,

And I'm really tending to that impulse.

And again,

Like kind of like waiting for what wants to come next,

Instead of just like automatically being like bigger,

Better,

Faster,

More,

You know?

Because I actually,

There's so much potency in the intimacy of what,

What we experienced and,

You know,

These kinds of gatherings tend to kind of lose,

Lose that potency when,

When they get too big.

Yeah.

Like at Wembley stadium.

Yeah.

No,

That's enough.

Um,

I want to ask,

Is your grandmother still alive?

So,

Uh,

Thank you for asking.

She actually passed away two summers ago.

Oh gosh.

Okay.

I'm so sorry.

Oh,

Thank you.

Yeah.

I mean,

I miss her and it also feels like her dying in the middle of me making this project was so divine.

Like the timing of it.

Cause I think,

You know,

I got,

After she passed away,

My mom sent me a box of like a bunch of stuff she had kept from me through the years.

And in the boxes full of all of these letters where I'm like,

I can't,

I don't like to be away from you.

I can't wait to get back to you.

Like I need,

You know?

And so I,

I'm reading between the lines of that,

Of like,

I think I was always just like so afraid to lose her.

Um,

And,

And it was the ultimate like test of my,

My faith in transformation and in the life death rebirth cycle to like,

Have to like lose the person closest to me and to have to like confront all that that brings up.

Um,

Yeah,

As much as I wish she was still here,

It was such a gift and it's led to like so many other blessings in my life.

So I was asking partially because I just love this image of you singing with her when you were so little,

But she got to see you have success and live into your gifts and go out in the world and take your gifts and give them to other people that must've just made her so happy.

I can't imagine.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

When I was,

There was a time when I was touring with the musician Moby and we had,

We had a show in San Francisco at the Warfield and my grandma lived in Folsom,

Which was like a couple hours away.

And when she knew that I was coming to town,

She rented a Hummer limousine for herself and like several of my family members and some of my old childhood friends and,

And drove these people to see me play in a,

In a Hummer limousine because she was so proud of me.

So yes,

Yes.

She is ridiculous in the best way.

We need more people like that,

I think in this world.

I mean,

Honestly,

I think,

You know,

I live,

Obviously I told you I live in Santa Fe and even when I lived in Portland,

Um,

There are a lot of people who take themselves so seriously and their entire life is just all about being serious.

And I think to myself,

You're missing the main point of life,

Which is to have fun and be silly and laugh.

And you know,

I,

But I understand there's all sorts of reasons for people to be serious.

And I,

You know,

Whatever shaped them,

Nature,

Nurture,

Whatever,

Bless their hearts.

But I just,

I'm like,

What's a life without laughter,

You know,

Or joy or,

Or even curiosity.

A lot of people aren't curious.

Yeah.

I don't get it.

Yeah,

You're like,

I agree.

Um,

I,

I'm in love with the fact that you brought up the goddess earlier.

And I'm suspecting that she's a pretty potent force in your life.

You know,

There was something funny I,

I read today,

And I doomscroll sometimes myself,

I'm just gonna admit that.

And but I was reading a meme where,

You know,

I don't know,

I guess you'd say a misogynist posted,

Name me one thing that any woman has ever brought into this world.

And someone below was like every single living human being you idiot.

And I thought,

You know,

I mean,

That's true.

We wouldn't be here,

Except for women.

Now,

It does take,

You know,

A man as well.

But the women carry the child for nine months.

They're the ones who have to give birth who,

You know,

At potentially the cost of their own life.

Yeah.

You know,

I think back to 10,

000 years ago,

When we didn't have hospitals,

When we didn't have antibiotics,

When we didn't,

I mean,

I'm sure the mortality rate was very high for women in childbirth.

So I just,

I have a space in my heart and my brain and my soul for the goddess,

Because she's always generative.

She's always generating something.

And it's with absolute trust and conviction that we'll know how to use that wisely those gifts that she gives.

Hmm.

Yeah,

Beautifully said.

So I'm just intrigued how you went from Lutheran to goddess.

I would love to know.

Yeah,

I mean,

I'm sure like,

Somewhere along the way,

I started to pick up on,

You know,

Like,

The patriarchal values that are kind of like baked into to,

To our current version of,

Of a lot of religions.

And yeah,

And referring to the Father,

The Son and the Holy Spirit.

And I think it connects with,

You know,

My growing sense of where we are off balance in these times,

Which is this way of like,

You know,

Human hierarchy,

Hierarchy,

Male hierarchy,

And the suppression of women and what we call,

You know,

Feminine energies,

Feminine values,

The more feeling realm.

So yeah,

I don't,

I don't know the exact,

Like,

Point to point along the map from like,

Because I,

You know,

I stopped going to church when I was a teenager,

It's been a long time.

But,

You know,

I think the goddess became this form that I connected more deeply to,

As I got,

As I became more connected to nature,

When I was in New York City for two decades,

And I moved to upstate New York,

Four and a half years ago.

And living here is like,

Really allowed me to be in deeper relationship with nature.

And to,

To really reconnect,

Because when I was a kid,

I was like,

Deeply connected with nature and spending a lot of time outside.

And I'm so grateful for that.

Yeah,

But I think it was like,

Through through me,

Reconnecting with nature and the cycles and and seeing the relationship between those things,

And what we call quote,

The goddess that I,

Yeah,

That that I had a form to kind of devote,

Devote myself to and to to try to channel those energies into what I'm creating and what's getting put out in the world.

Beautiful.

I,

I was thinking that it,

The goddess must have felt very present in Iceland.

Would you say that's true?

Yeah,

Yeah,

I would say I felt her even more strongly when I was in Crete,

Actually.

Yeah.

But yes,

Also,

I mean,

Yeah.

Also,

Iceland,

But Crete,

Crete was loud and like,

And like,

Quite literally,

You know,

The time of year that I was there,

The insects are like,

Pulsing,

Like,

To almost like a deafening degree.

And I realized after the fact,

When I went back to like,

Listen to these old demos that I had been recording when I was in Crete,

How much the pulse of nature informed and was a collaborator in the music that I was making.

And now when I listen to the record,

It's all to this pulse.

And that connects directly back to the mother.

And that connects directly back to why caves,

Like the womb and the tomb.

Yeah.

Wow.

Wow.

I could talk to you forever.

I'm just letting you know that.

Thanks.

Likewise.

I'd love to ask you the main question,

Which is,

I would so appreciate it.

You've already told some stories that I think are poignant.

And I don't know,

For me,

Finding those tapes,

Singing with your grandmother,

That was a magical moment,

You know,

And getting to revisit those moments over and over through time.

It's almost like time traveling,

Going to Iceland and having this magical 10 days.

The improvisation is magical to me miraculous,

First of all,

Because I can't play an instrument.

And so what you're talking about is just bonkers to me.

But I'd love for you to share a story,

Or stories or whatever you feel called to about something magical,

Miraculous or mysterious that's happened in your life.

Well,

Thank you for this invitation.

Yeah,

I knew you're gonna ask this question.

So I've been sitting with it and letting it kind of like hover in my consciousness for the past couple months.

And I'm going to share a story that's like pretty vulnerable.

And I haven't shared publicly before,

But it feels appropriate.

So and there's a couple layers of magic to the story.

So I think I mentioned earlier,

You know,

That there was this period of time,

When I was playing with the Moby,

Or the musician Moby.

And just to backtrack a little bit,

In my mid 20s,

I was in a band called Salt and Samovar.

And we had a show scheduled at this bar in New Jersey,

Just kind of like a regular,

You know,

Thursday night kind of show.

And as we got closer to the performance date,

The headliner backed out.

And so I think the promoter was like really scrambling was like,

How am I going to like,

Find a replacement and especially like someone who can like draw a crowd.

And so apparently,

He like posted a video on YouTube saying,

Like if any of the following musicians agree to play this show,

I'll play you $1,

000.

And Moby was one of them.

And I guess I don't know if someone forwarded it to him or what,

But somehow Moby sees this video and and reaches out to the promoter and is like,

Yeah,

Sure,

I'll play your show.

And so I like accidentally end up opening for Moby.

And I can't quite explain what happened.

But I will say that I felt this really strong impulse to just be so present,

And so in devotion to the music that night.

And something happened because then like a few days later,

Moby reached out to my then bandmate via Myspace and asked for my info.

And so we start like hanging out and he asked me to sing on his record.

I sang on this record he put out called Wait For Me.

And then he jumped on board with this album I was working on at the time called Peace and became one of the co-producers.

And then eventually,

He asked me to go on tour with him.

Like he was like,

I'm going to Europe for six weeks.

Will you please come?

And I was like,

Yes.

Yeah,

So I like,

I joined Moby's band and I was like playing keys and I was singing and I was like,

Having the time of my life like flying in private planes,

Staying in five star hotels and getting room service.

Yeah,

Until they shut that all down.

But like,

Yeah,

It was it was a really good ride.

And it was also really challenging because I was a mom.

And at the time,

My son was two.

Yeah,

So I was leaving my son at,

You know,

A really critical time in terms of like,

His development and the development of our relationship and his,

You know,

Feeling of attachment and safety.

And it was really,

It was a really conflicted time for me because I was like,

Oh,

This is such an incredible opportunity.

But like,

I'm really sacrificing so much.

And I ended up touring with him off and on for about two years.

And eventually,

You know,

We went our separate ways.

And that experience of conflict and regret really weighed on me for a long time of like,

Man,

Like,

Really doubting myself.

And like,

Did I do the right thing?

Like,

Because,

You know,

I had learned so much from the experience,

I learned a lot about what I did like about being a tour musician,

And a lot of stuff that I that I didn't like.

And I hadn't,

Had I not gone,

I wouldn't have had those lessons.

But I was also like,

Did I fuck up my kid,

You know,

And is this going to come back to bite both of us?

So all to say it,

Like it's it weighed on me for a long time.

And then fast forward to 2021.

I was,

I joined a,

An online women's circle that was all about unpacking being good enough.

And we met weekly,

And we were guided through these visualization exercises.

And we took turns practicing nature and energy healing work on one each other.

And each week,

We would like take turns working with these tools to heal a member of the group.

And when it was my turn to to receive the healing energy from the group,

I was invited to visualize myself and like a really safe place in nature.

And I immediately went to this ridge that I had spent a lot of time on during the pandemic that just was like,

Covered in the like,

Softest,

Most nurturing moss ever and surrounded by like all of these amazing pine trees.

And there was like a river with like a waterfall.

And so I immediately saw myself in that place.

And then the facilitator then invited me to to let come to the surface something painful and something that I was needing healing around,

Like being good enough.

And in this wound around my mother and came up.

And I start to see my son like walking towards me on on the ridge,

And he's like young,

His younger self.

And I'm just like,

Apologizing to him for leaving him.

And I'm like,

Apologizing to myself and trying to send myself love and compassion.

And then all of a sudden,

I just feel this like really palpable energy surrounding me.

And it's these women sending me loving light and healing energy.

And then out of nowhere,

My son who is 14 at the time and in the room,

The next room over yells out,

I love you,

Mom.

And I just lost it.

Yeah,

I can't believe I just told that without crying.

Yay.

I'm like,

I just felt so called to share this story because I think it demonstrates the magic of intention and attention and our ability to heal each other and ourselves.

And also how fast healing can be sometimes.

Because I think a lot of times what keeps us in the fear state of like,

I can't even touch that wound is this misconception that like going into the wound is going to take over and it's going to take your entire life to fix that thing.

And like in that instant,

We were all healed.

Was I speaking the truth when I was saying that Kelly is so very groovy and talented and funny and self-effacing and just really,

Really,

Really groovy because I feel like that cannot be overstated.

We need her magic in this world.

We need someone who's so dynamic and whose talents are diverse and whose nature is incredibly generous.

And Kelly is all that and more.

I really,

Really could have talked to her for like a day and a half,

I swear to God.

Anyway,

I want to thank Kelly for being on the show.

I'm really grateful that she and I are on earth at the same time so that we could have this conversation.

And so I could meet another person that gives me hope,

Quite honestly,

Knowing that there's so much gorgeousness in the world and Kelly and her life and her work and her way of being in the world is just a testament to how we can never lose hope,

How we can never forget that there are so many people out there trying to make this world a more gorgeous and expansive place.

Yeah,

And I think this is where I ask for ratings and reviews.

If you appreciated this conversation with Kelly,

If you liked hearing her story,

If you've liked any of the stories that I brought,

Please do consider leaving a rating and writing a review.

Those ratings and reviews are so helpful.

So many people find the podcast because of other people's accolades.

So I would appreciate any and all of the love that you can give me this holiday season because I do work hard on it and it makes me happy to do so.

But yeah,

I'd love to see a few more ratings or maybe another review.

Thank you for listening.

And here's my one request.

Be like Kelly.

I mean,

I don't know.

Kelly is so multi-talented.

I mean,

She just saw her talents or witnessed her capacities for music and voice and joy when she was young and she just went for it.

I mean,

If that's not an unstoppable spirit,

I don't know what is.

Plenty of people can look at their talents and say,

Okay,

I'm pretty good at that.

Okay,

I have a pretty good voice.

And then they never follow up.

They never follow through.

They never utilize their gifts,

Their talents,

Their charisms to make this world a beautiful place.

But Kelly's doing it and she's owning it and she's going farther and further than anyone else before her because she is now blending the magic that she has discovered and utilizing her talents to bring the rest of us revelation.

But whatever she's doing,

It is causing us to think,

To ponder,

To consider,

And to maybe understand that there are depths that we haven't yet plumbed as humans and that we still have so much farther to go.

Well,

Kelly's leading the way for all of us.

She's showing us the way.

So be like Kelly and find your own path.

Find what you're good at and illuminate a way forward for the rest of us because we need each and every one of you to discover your gifts,

Discover what you're good at,

And then hold a lantern for the rest of us so we too can find our way forward in the dark.