Seth's Travels

Seth Montfort’s First Latin American Temple, Treehouse & Jungle Concert Tour

After 20 years stuck in the Bay Area performing with and running San Francisco Concerto Orchestra, a friend of mine, Lawrence “Orny” Wilcox, offered to take me to Mexico. The main goal was to spend the Equinox with around 100,000 others who gather at the Mayan archeological site, Chichen Itza. The Mayans designed the great pyramid, El Castillo, also called the Temple of Kukulkan, so that twice a year, on the Spring and Autumn Equinox (3 days around March 21 and September 21), on the corner of the structure the rising and setting sun casts a shadow in the shape of a serpent - Kukulcan, or Quetzalcoatl - along the west side of the north staircase. The Temple of Kukulkan, is one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It is a monument to the Maya's precision and craftsmanship. This Temple has 91 steps to the top on each side (totaling 364 steps plus one for the platform at the top making 365 steps, one for each day of the year). It has 52 panels on each side representing the 52 year cycle of the Maya calendar. What my friend, Orny, did not know was that I had been obsessed with the Jungle since I was a child and that I had more recently been writing music reflecting both the Ancient Spanish and Native American aspects of Mexico for over 8 years. I am an American of French descent but had been composing this music as a result of two dreams I had in the fall of 2000 in which I heard melodies and rhythms evoking Ancient Mexico and Spain. I gradually have come to realize that by developing these veins of music something inside was trying to come to terms with the meaning of the Spanish Inquisition. It still is! So I was quite excited to finally actually get the chance to visit Jungles and Ancient Temples of Mexico.

But my biggest project had been composing my two-hour long still unfinished Aztec Piano Symphony. So a few weeks before we were to leave I went on line to see if I could quickly book some concerts in Mexico City in order to expand this trip to include Ancient Aztec Sites as well as the Temple to the Sun at Teotihuacan nearby.

Teotihuacan and Temple to the Sun

Since I had no contacts there I for some reason remembered that Bette Midler had made her start in gay bathhouses. So I did a search and came up with a new bath house run by American ex pats in Tepoztlan Morelos Mexico. I contacted them and asked them if they had a piano. They wrote back immediately to say that though they did not have a piano that there was a really fine piano at a deluxe resort nearby and that they had recently been to a very fine classical piano concert there. So I contacted this resort, Villa Del Tepozfuego, and they immediately invited me to give a concert. Tepoztlan is a very Ancient feeling magical place that like Sedona Arizona is situated in sacred mountains (with an Ancient Tepozteco Pyramid) and there are reputed to be special spiritual energies

Roof of Villa Del Tepozfuego

Hiking above Tepoztlan

Tepozteco Pyramid

there from incomparable vortex energy, which may be why the Tepoztecos considered it to be a sacred area. Copland spent three months composing in Tepoztlan and said his composing went so well he would have stayed forever if he had only been able to get the New York Times (now you can). It turned out to be an incomparably beautiful resort in a town of 100,000 that still feels like a very quaint little village. There is nothing modern there, but plenty of ancient cobblestone lanes and you hear the horses clomping and roosters crowing every morning. The town has nothing resembling Walmart but is filled with family stores and Ancient Colonial Architecture surrounded by breathtaking mountains.

I had also Googled "Mexico Colonial Archeology Jungle Hotel Piano Tour” and among many other venues came up with Enkidu Magazine, Mexico City’s super intellectual gay online news magazine and think tank. It turned out that they had an annual Academic festival featuring 120 speakers from 80 universities throughout the World and they invited me to perform at it on a 9 foot Steinway over the grave of a lesbian nun in an ancient monastery at the Cloister of Sor Juana University, Mexico City:

I had sent them my jungle gold lamé Aztec loin cloth/dress pic (see Seth Montfort Audience Request List & Bio) with the information about my Jungle and Temple music and the letter that came back to me made it sound as if they hoped I might dare to reawake the embodiment of some favored mysterious ancient primitive being or God! The concert was just blocks from Templo Mayor and the Ancient Spanish Cathedrals and playing my Jungle Recital there was like entering my 2000 dream.

Templo Mayor

Ancient Cathedral across from
Templo Mayor

Same Cathedral seen behind same Templo Mayor of which only stone walls are left. This Templo is said to be situated around the exact spot where the aztecs sacred eagle sat a snake in its mouth.

Afterwards we hit the town with all their diverse academic students and professors from just about every corner of the World. Lars, the organizer of the Festival was our archeologist tour guide but this tour focused on hitting all the more colorful Mexico City destinations “Lonely Planet tells you not to go to.” It was a blast! They invited me back to perform this year but that was just as the Swine Flu “epidemic” was arriving so that had to be postponed for a bit.

With two concerts booked already and a trip lined up that still didn't include any visit to the true primeval jungle, I decided to try my luck with Belize and through contacting the rustic & remote Macaw Bank Jungle Lodge I was immediately advised to contact the George Price Center for Peace and Development as it was one of the only venues with a climate controlled environment and well kept piano (the wet tropics are rough on pianos). They booked me immediately too. I told the Director, Elsie, Pook’s Hill was the Jungle lodge I wanted to stay at most. She said Ray was her friend and so she called him and he graciously offered to sponsor my concert. Thanks Ray! The Center is one of the best run in Latin America and has a very modern, controlled climate hall with an extraordinarily well serviced piano. All hard to find in the steamy tropics! There was a good turnout and the audience was friendly, knowledgeable and appreciative and you couldn’t find a more ultimate wild jungle lodging experience than Pook’s Hill! I think there is even a blog on line from an ex pat from San Francisco who was out of town and missed the event but had heard me in SF. Actually we had flown to Guatemala first on the way to Belize in order to see the Mayan Jungle and Temples of Tikal in Guatemala.

These are Temple of the Jaguar, other Temples, and Monkeys hiding in the canopy.

Then we took a cab from there to the Macaw Bank Jungle Lodge near San Ignacio, Belize. We explored Jungles and Mayan Ruins at that charming and remote rustic lodge for two days and then the owners took us to Pook’s Hill near Belmopan, Belize. Pook’s Hill is in a thicker, taller, wetter part of Belize and perhaps about as ultimate primeval Jungle lodging as it gets. The managers knew I wanted the real jungle experience so they gave us one of the two thatch huts without bug nets on the other side of a beautiful long bridge across a river. We thus shared the room with giant insects and tarantulas (which only LOOK dangerous)! It was a truly high class and incomparably deluxe room.

The following live video feed and other enticing info is taken from Pook’s Hill website!
http://www.pookshilllodge.com/PooksWeb2.mov

Experience the adventure of the Belizean rainforest; the early mists, the wealth of birds and wildlife; discover hidden Maya ruins; float along a crystal clear jungle river. Join the journey to the Ancient Maya Underworld; saddle up for adventure........

Pook’s Hill Lodge is located at the foothills of the Maya Mountains in the Cayo District of Belize, bordering the Roaring River and Tapir Mountain Nature Reserve. The lodge is situated within a 300 acre Private Reserve encompassing the site of an ancient Maya Plazeula Group. This, coupled with its unparalleled position in the very heart of the country, makes Pook’s Hill a perfect base to discover the sites and sounds of Belize.

The adventure begins along the ¾-mile access road that leads you through the rainforest; private nature trails in the reserve take you past giant Mahogany, Cedar, Strangling Fig and Ceiba. The forest is the home of Belizean mammals such as the tapir, jaguar, coati mundi, gibnut......

The thatched cabanas surround a Maya site and overlook the forest canopy and creek below. The bar/veranda is ideal for birding or just relaxing in the tranquil setting.

Adventurers, researchers, birders, families, and those looking to explore all that Belize has to offer will find Pook’s Hill an ideal destination.

Activities at the lodge include: birding, hiking, river tubing and swimming. The lodge is walking distance from the cave, , Actun Tunichil Mucnal, the most adventurous caving expedition in Belize. We also offer cave tubing or canoeing on the Belize and Macal rivers or tours to Caracol, Tikal and Xunantunich.

The one city I had less luck getting a concert in was Merida Mexico, near Chichen Itza. I finally booked a benefit concert for Brazos Abiertos, only Mexico’s third ever AIDS organization. The people were amazing and they put us up for 10 days in a super deluxe former B&B now private home. We had it to ourselves with two chefs who cooked three incomparably authentic deluxe Yucatan style complimentary meals a day for us. Merida feels somehow more civilized than any American city. Three musicians from San Francisco Concerto Orchestra play in Merida Symphony part time and so they got several members of the Merida symphony to show up. The former concert master, Christopher Collins Lee, still has a second home there. He came to my concert, and made a point of telling me that classical Jungle Music was a new genre to him and suggested we do a Jungle Tour together. He has also specialized somewhat in performing in unusual venues. That may be one of the reasons he found my Jungle and Temple tour to be such an intriguing idea. His more conventional performances have included appearances as a soloist with The New York Philharmonic, the Berlin Philharmonic, the London Symphony, and many other orchestras. We are just now planning concerts for fall 2009 to fall 2010 in Guerneville and around the US and Latin America. He is a Merida Superstar and up and coming violinist around the World. He has made it on World’s “top musicians to watch for” lists and is currently concert master of 10 orchestras in New York City area. Here he is with his violin -

At the last minute I Googled treehouse piano Costa Rica and found Ray Beise, the super brilliant and visionary naturalist founder of the Pura Jungla reforestation project. It is a 250 acre project that has successfully replanted the jungle and restored the ecosystem in a mere 20 years. It is funded in part by sparse real estate in the form of giant treehouses. I could write a book on this place and devote my life to it. I just may. When Ray was deciding whether it was worth the effort to spend a month of his life on my two concerts he found my wild pics on line and thought “this guy is crazy too, this could work.” At first his beautiful Costa Rican wife didn't seem so sure all this work on concerts was the right choice for business but the attendance was great which brought some much deserved new attention on this remarkable treehouse jungle preserve. Her somewhat preoccupied look vanished once I started to play and even with a bit of a language barrier she communicated a true love of the music with utmost elegance. She turned out to be one of the most memorable people on all my trips. Every time I return to the music I wrote there, one melody in particular, I can still see her striking face and charm. I played the first year at the Jungla Vista Treehouse.

While I was there I got an email from a Marin County resident who had been to a concert of mine and was on my email list. He owned a treehouse there too! I could stay there if I liked. But I didn't have email access so I didn't find that out until I got home. But I was invited back and so Pura Jungla flew me down this February to play four concerts at his giant duplex Casa Margarita Treehouse.

I was able to stay there for 12 days alone in the Jungle two miles from another human with no windows, phone, email or car. I was in heaven, composing and practicing in 90 degree weather with frequent rare and powerfully inspiring winds ripping around me mixed with intermittent calm and incredible plant and animal life speaking to me day and night, especially howler monkeys who came sunrise and sunset every day to greet me by eating the spectacular pink and yellow flowers in the trees above. I always knew when they were there either by their howling (the loudest King Kong like animal sound on the planet) or by hearing the thud of their throwing poop on the roof. Pura Jungla is now opening a giant treehouse, kind of Ray’s magnum opus on top of the highest hill and as almost all the treehouses there do, it overlooks the Pacific Ocean and has incomparable sunset views. It is many stories high and is even big enough for my orchestra to play in. I will be playing there soon possibly even with orchestra!

After returning from my first trip I wrote a book, Aliens Made Me Play Gershwin, which has been described by the Arts Council of Sonoma as a “best seller.” In it I document much of this trip as well as my family and career history and information about the idols who have shaped my life the most. The book has 13 Skulls rather than chapters and is based on the premise that the value of the Mayan 13 Crystal Skulls legend may be the nature of the legend itself. The 13 Skulls are supposed to be beyond current capacity for mankind to understand. They were left by the Mayans to only all 13 finally be discovered (7 have reputedly been found so far) during a time of great crisis and only finally comprehensible at that time when they will be needed most. So I decided that I might evolve through inventing my own metaphoric 13 Skulls in the form of 13 chapters, several of which document my first trip to Latin America with anecdotes and many photos. The book is available at my concerts or by calling (707) 604-7600.

If you would like to join me on my next tour to the Desert Southwest or Latin America email seth@sfconcerto.org!

Here is a page of photos from the trip, as recorded in his book, Aliens Made Me Play Gershwin

A couple of weeks have passed now since your marvelous performance in the tree house here in Pura Jungla. The accolades are just now beginning to decrease in frequency and intensity. Your fantastic performance was of the stuff of which dreams are composed. Seth, I would like to offer you the most heart felt thank you possible and I am most certain that everyone who attended your unforgettable Jungle concert had their souls lightened and their lives made happier by you and your music.

For me, you caused something to stir in my soul and my psyche. You gave me back something that had been missing in my life for quite a while. I thank you for that also.

With the rocket ship pace required to make the preparations for your concert precious little time was available for thinking. YOU caused a dead piano to be brought back to life. You and your music and your enthusiasm also brought something back to life inside of me. Thank you.

The general consensus is that we need MORE of the same – I couldn’t agree more! So, the task now becomes to open ourselves to the possibilities and bring more cultural “Events” to the savages of the Jungle!

This is the flier advertising the events.

Click on the image for full page version!

Jeanne and I both continue to receive very positive feedback from people who attended or even heard about the two-evening April 6-7 incredible Seth Montfort piano concert at our Pura Jungla tree house in Costa Rica. We were even notified that your music had drifted through the forest trees and was heard right over the far side of the next mountain.

That Ray, Rodney and Seth and your friend Lawrence pulled this major event off so successfully is absolutely amazing! The piano as we all know had a story of its own. This very unique tree house jungle concert was likely an once-in-a-lifetime event for all of us who were fortunate enough to be there. “Rhapsody in Blue” as the finale noticeably brought tears to several eyes.

Seth, we thank you for traveling here and sharing your wonderful talent. We have never before experienced an event anything like this exceptional performance.

Paul, Jeanne and Ray and Rodney and all the Pura Jungla inhabitants, guests and creatures