About Us
The Triangle Universal Chanting Group
Our Universal Chanting group began with a weekend chanting retreat at Southern Dharma in the mountains of western North Carolina in 1985. That weekend we chanted only Om. We found at the end that many of us lived in the Triangle area of North Carolina so we began monthly meetings and expanded our repertoire to include chants of many spiritual traditions.
Jon Seskevich (voice, harmonium, percussion) is co-founder of the Triangle Universal Chanting Group in the Durham/Chapel Hill area of North Carolina. He is a nurse who specializes in stress management clinical practice and is involved in meditation research at a major academic medical center. See his Web site at www.managestressnow.com
In 1974, Jon started his training in meditation, bhakti, and karma yogas under the mentorship of Ram Dass. Soon after, Jon began playing the harmonium and now has extensive experience in leading devotional chanting. His other chanting mentors include Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, and Robert Gass, the director of the On Wings of Song chorus.
Mark Smith (voice, guitar) is a singer, songwriter and instrumentalist whose work calls forth the joy, passion, gratitude and musical spirit in each of us. He has thirty years of experience with the music, meditations and healing spiritualities of a variety of traditions, including Buddhist, Quaker, Christian, Huna, Navaho, Shinto, Celtic, folk, blues, rock & roll, gospel, shape-note and other musical styles. See his Web site at www.mgeesmith.com
Larry Taylor is a musician. He has a decade of experience with dances and chants from spiritual traditions around the world and evokes their flavor and feeling in the variety of instruments he plays, including the bouzouki, the bamboo flute, the ney, the Native American water drum, the gopichand, and the manjur…to name a few. He is a supporting musician with The Dances in North Carolina.
Chanting is a universal practice and experience throughout the world's great spiritual, religious and cultural traditions. Chanting quiets the mind and opens the heart. We are profoundly delighted to share our first CD with you. It is sparkling with chants from the Hindu, Sufi, Christian, Buddhist, and Native American traditions. The spirit of this music is exuberant, joyous, energetic, and reverent. 
