In Kathmandu, Finding Notes of Commonality in Nepali Folk Music

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28-03-2025

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I'm on a brick patio at Northfield, a popular café in Kathmandu, Nepal, strumming 'Will the Circle Be Unbroken' on my guitar alongside Les Thompson, a founding member of the pioneering SoCal folk and bluegrass act the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. I've spent more than a decade going to bluegrass festivals, buying bluegrass records, and learning to flat-pick much of the American bluegrass canon; playing with Thompson anywhere would be a dream. But this is extremely special. We are surrounded by more than 20 Nepali Gandarbhas, who follow us on fiddle-like sarangis, bamboo bansuri flutes, and madal drums. Gandarbhas are a nomadic musician caste who for centuries have wandered the hills here, playing songs to earn a living. After the last note, our Nepali friends launch into their folk anthem 'Resham Firiri.' Thompson points out that, if you lose the percussion, it sounds like American Appalachian music.
We're in Nepal with Music Arts Adventures, a tour company that offers an unconventional approach to discovering the country known for Everest by introducing visitors to Nepali artisans. It's the brainchild of Tara Linhardt, a musician I met years ago during a jam session at Brooklyn's legendary Sunny's Bar, which she now runs with her husband, Ian Poole. A Virginia native, Linhardt studied here in college and fell in love with the culture. Since then, she has returned repeatedly and eventually made a documentary film and an album, both called The Mountain Music Project, in which she and another musician, Danny Knicely, illustrate the commonalities between Appalachian and Himalayan folk music. Old-time bluegrass players and Gandarbhas—who are thought to have migrated to the Himalayas from Rajasthan and likely share ancestry with the Romani people—are both traditionally poor people from the mountains who scratch out a living with their instruments.
Linhardt recalls being struck by how much the two groups had in common: 'The resourcefulness of the people, the sense of humor. When we met some of the Gandarbha musicians, it was obvious that the musicality was very similar. It's string-oriented and uses the same scales.'
I'm part of a cohort of 15, which, in addition to Thompson, Linhardt, and Poole, includes other musicians and music lovers from the US as well as Nabin Moktan, a guide. Our visit begins at the quirky Ramsterdam Cafe, not far from the Boudhanath Stupa, a holy site for Tibetan Buddhists. Outfitted with Jerry Garcia posters and bottle-cap murals, the café also has a stage where we take part in an impromptu jam session with some local musicians, including 16-year-old Benjamin Das Tatma, the son of Ramsterdam's owner, who wears snakeskin cowboy boots and shreds his way through Billy Strings's 'Dust in a Baggie.'
The next morning, after a walk through the Pashupatinath Temple, a sacred Hindu site where we see families performing funeral rites along the banks of the Bagmati River, we visit Naad Sangeet Pathshala—a school founded by Sarita Mishra, the first professional woman tabla player in Nepal—to offer music and dance classes to underprivileged kids. (Three of us wind up donating guitars we'd bought in Kathmandu to use during the trip.) The kids perform dances for us, along with a couple of songs on madals and bansuris, including the ubiquitous 'Resham Firiri,' which I'd already heard floating out of shops, hotel lobbies, and restaurants.
'Tara,' I hear Thompson ask, 'what mode are they playing in?'
'It's just G, 4/4 time,' Linhardt replies. 'There's nothing not bluegrass about it.'
The following day we head to Bhaktapur, a historic city a few miles east of Kathmandu, where we visit an after-school program dedicated to keeping young girls out of child marriages. Thompson and I get enlisted to perform for the youngsters, and we play Hank Williams's 'Jambalaya' while Poole teaches them a square dance. Afterward the kids lead us to a nearby temple. A 12-year-old boy called Pawan holds my hand as we walk, and we apply tikas to each other's foreheads using the red dye on the idols.
In the evening we attend a show on the rooftop of the Vajra Boutique Hotel, where a troupe of young dancers in bright red and yellow dresses and clay-and-cloth masks perform ceremonial dances. Afterward one of the musicians from the backing band, a 23-year-old multi-instrumentalist named Roshika Jadhari, whom Linhardt has known for years, joins us in the lobby for an impromptu 'jam up' (as the Nepalis call it). We start with the 19th-century traditional 'Angeline the Baker,' then do 'Resham Firiri,' with Jadhari accompanying our guitars on bansuri. 'It's kind of similar,' she says of the two kinds of music, 'but it's different also. Every song has its unique features.'
A waiter asks if he can borrow Poole's guitar. ''Knockin' on Heaven's Door,'' he says. 'Guns N' Roses.' Before I can say the name Dylan, he's singing the song, and I'm joining in, as do all the guests and hotel staffers in the lobby. 'Musicians love to meet other musicians,' Linhardt says. Jadhari laughs and nods.
The itinerary isn't all jams. Linhardt arranges visits to Bungamati, a village renowned for its wood-carvers and where she lived while studying; pottery stalls; and a thangka-painting school. It's the music that draws me most, though. One morning we stop by the Music Museum of Nepal, which curator and owner Ram Prasad Kadel established in 1995 to preserve music customs. Among the collection of nearly 1,200 instruments is an array of sarangis and tungnas, and a 10-foot-long laawaa horn. 'Most of the old people are dying, and all the skill and talent in their minds is not written down,' says Kadel.
Toward the end of the trip, we go to Project Sarangi, another organization that aims to preserve and promote Nepali folk music. It's run by Kiran Nepali, the virtuoso sarangi player for Kutumba, a revolutionary Nepali band that has toured all over the world. Our group sits in a circle in the project's classroom, and Nepali shows off his favored instrument and tells us about his path to becoming a musician.
'I'm a Gandarbha,' he tells us. 'Generations of my forefathers have been playing, but I didn't start early, because my father said we should study.' He began Project Sarangi to try to destigmatize Gandarbhas and encourage young people to pick up the instrument. Nepali built a factory to standardize manufacturing and opened this teaching space to give lessons. He also employed effect pedals to go with other rock-and-roll elements in Kutumba's shows. 'You have to make it cool,' he says.
Ironically, digging into his own people's music has helped Nepali play a variety of folk styles around the world. He recalls visiting Scotland, where a local musician began playing a tune on bagpipes. 'We were like, 'That's very familiar.' Same thing happened to me with bluegrass. Same thing happened to me with Irish music. All this folk music, somehow it's connected.' Linhardt and Nepali then lead us in a jam. I do my best to keep up as they exchange the rapid-fire notes of the bluegrass standard 'Squirrel Hunters.' She's on mandolin, he's on sarangi, but somehow they're speaking the same language, a worldly tongue I've gotten a little closer to picking up myself.
This article appeared in the April 2025 issue of Condé Nast Traveler. Subscribe to the magazine here.
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