A Visit with Addwitiya Roberta Flack, Beloved Singer, Songwriter and Musician

While waiting for Addwitiya to arrive, Sri Chinmoy said: As soon as she comes, we will sing the songs. She is our dearest friend, dearest sister. Her love for us is absolutely sincere, absolutely, and vice versa: our love for her comes from the very depths of our heart. She is all for us.

When Addwitiya arrived, apologising for being late, Sri Chinmoy welcomed her and said: Whenever you come is the right time. Your love for us is boundless. Our love for you is boundless. When we deal with boundless love, we go far beyond time and space. So whenever you come is the most perfect time. Love is oneness. Oneness does not depend on earthbound time. Let us live in eternal time.

Before the Singers performed, Addwitiya was happy to recognise familiar faces, exclaiming: I know I’m in the right place because you guys are still here.

Addwitiya (referring to the flowers and decorations at Aspiration-Ground): This is so beautiful! It’s always beautiful, but today and this time, just for my eyes, because I’m not here every week like you are, it’s especially beautiful. It’s wonderful, it’s wonderful!

The Singers offered several songs Sri Chinmoy had composed in her honour, including several set to her words. After the first song, “Roberta Flack,” Addwitiya said: Thank you! Give yourselves a hand! Thank you so much.

After the Singers performed the rest of the songs, Sri Chinmoy requested her to speak, saying: Now kindly tell us something about your lifelong achievements and other things. I am anxious and eager to hear from you about your lifelong achievements.

Addwitiya: You know, above all, I’m so blessed! Sisters and brothers from all over the world, first of all I’m sitting here beside Guru, and I’ve had a very, very, very busy time in my life since I was here right on this spot a little while ago.

Speaking about starting her own record label, and young musicians re-recording her song: This is something that I feel grateful to God the Father for, because I am influencing their thinking, not harmonically and not melodically, but in terms of content, which is probably, in my opinion as an ex-school teacher, the most important thing that these young people could get from anybody who has been out here for a while. They can get the lesson that the content can change, and the song can still be important. Unfortunately, all of the scandal and bad content is encouraged by the industry because that of course sells CDs.

I’m sharing this story because I think that the songs that Guru has written for me are so important for me. They do express how I feel. I feel so important in terms of how people look at me and receive me, but I feel so helpless that just with the songs and just with the love and just with the heart, you can’t change the way people treat each other. A lot of these youngsters who are influenced by my music do have the funds. I mean, they’re making millions. I think we have to convince these young people that there is beauty and there is melody and there is harmony and that they can do something with all of this wealth, not just material wealth, but with all of this wealth of opportunity to go and do things and make the world a better place.

Speaking of Sri Chinmoy’s guidance: When I’m in Guru’s presence and when I’m here with you, it’s like being in another world. It’s like being in another part of the world, the best part of the world. The energy that brings you here is so full of spirit and goodness, and you are so humble and you are so beautiful, and you’re trying to make a difference, and you are being successful. It may seem hard because the sacrifice is always great – I know it is. But your reward is that you get people like me to get up and come and see you. I don’t care if you ever come to see me. I just want to be allowed to come to see you because when I leave here, I am so much stronger.

You know I’m not making this up, because you guys get it too. You get it. You cannot be around Guru, you can’t be this close especially, and not feel the surge, and that is a blessing. I am so blessed by God the Father to have been guided to Sri Chinmoy.

You can be an entertainer like I am or like Narada [Michael Walden] or, bless his heart, Mokshagun Clarence Clemons. You can be a well-known person. Meeting Guru sort of brings you down to the least common denominator. You under-stand what I’m saying, where this one number goes into everything. And it’s always correct because it’s the right number. Guru is so powerful in his spiritual essence that people like myself, everybody, would benefit, but especially people who don’t have time, who think, “I don’t have time. I can’t do it. I don’t have time to meditate. I don’t have time to read the Bible. I don’t have time to pray. I got to go, got to go. Got to be on stage, got to learn the song.”

Speaking about receiving an upcoming Emmy Award, and honorary doctorate from the University of Massachusetts when she delivers the commencement address: I was with Maya Angelou and Oprah Winfrey last Friday because Dr. Angelou had her 75th birthday, and Oprah is her godchild, and I was invited to share this with them. When Dr. Angelou got up to thank everybody who was there – and it was a great crowd of people from all races, all over the world – one of the last things she did was to quote a Negro spiritual, which says, “Done made my vow to the Lord, and I never will turn back. Oh I will go. I shall go to see what the end will be.” And that’s the way I feel about my life and my career as an artist and as a musician. I am not through. But I accept all the awards, Guru, that they give me, and I’m grateful for them.

After answering some questions from the audience, Addwitiya asks the visiting disciples to come up according to their countries, in alphabetical order, and speaks about her experiences with each country, sometimes playing music from their composers or folk songs. She commented: And you guys are sitting with a great composer, because a good composer, and Guru will tell you, is committed to composing. It’s like when he starts to paint birds. He doesn’t know if it’s going to be a billion or a gazillion. It’s actually a blessing to be able to sing a song, to be able to paint a picture – you know what I’m saying? – to be able to do something that’s outside of what you look like and outside of what you represent. You’re a weightlifter.

You can lift billions of pounds. It’s a blessing. And it gives you goose bumps. It gives me goose bumps to talk about all these musicians. I think, “Oh gosh, I’m so glad I studied that. I’m so glad I heard that. Thank you, God.” It’s wonderful, I’m telling you, it’s wonderful.

You are blessed to be in Guru’s presence. He’s a great composer, and so prolific!

Sri Chinmoy then lifts Addwitiya as part of the “Lifting Up the World with a Oneness-Heart” programme.

Sri Chinmoy: This medallion we give to Presidents and Prime Ministers, but you are our prime minister and president in our heart’s world. In our heart’s world, you are our beloved president, beloved prime minister.

Addwitiya: Thank you, Guru. Your love is so beautiful.

Sri Chinmoy: Addwitiya – her heart is larger than the largest: that we all know. And we shall always cherish it in the very depths of our own heart. Until we breathe our last, we shall always feel and cherish and treasure her heart of boundless love for us. Her boundless, boundless love for us we treasure in our heart-temple, plus her love for us is written in letters of gold. In letters of gold her love is written on the tablet of our heart.

Addwitiya: I love my Guru! And I’m inspired by all of you because you came from so far away to see someone that I love. I just want to thank you for giving me a chance to be here this day to share with you how much I love Guru as well.

As the audience applauds, Sri Chinmoy accompanies Addwitiya to the Pilgrim-Museum.

Following are three songs that Sri Chinmoy composed in honour of Addwitiya, as well as five songs with music set to her inspiring words.