Frequently asked questions
Where should I get a harmonium? Mridanga? Kartals? Guitar?
For harmoniums, head over to our store at the Kirtan Central website. Daniel recently teamed up with harmonium specialist Nic Dillon to present the "Bhava" line of harmoniums, currently available in two styles: Bhava Classic and Bhava Mini.
For Indian percussion like mridangas, tablas and kartals, check out Old Delhi Music.
And for guitars, try guitarcenter.com. They might even have an outlet store in your area, where you can try out lots of guitars with the help of their staff, and pick the right one.
I don't have any musical background... Will I really be able to learn this way?
When you are standing on the edge of the unknown and getting ready to leap, it's always a bit scary!
Yes, you will be able to learn the harmonium and sing kirtan songs. Music instruments can seem daunting at first, but with the easy-to-follow instruction provided in our course videos, you'll feel at home very quickly. Also, you are not alone! Most people who get caught by the bhakti bug are not already musicians. So although it can be a little awkward learning something new at first, gradually, with practice, playing your instrument will become second nature. I have seen students who thought they were "tone deaf" or "couldn't keep a beat" become kirtan leaders. The Names are powerful, and practicing is powerful! Yes you can do this.
I learn best with printed materials... will my membership include that?
Yes! More than ninety percent of our courses have "supplement sheets" which present the music exercise or song being learned in that course. When a member is logged in, they can see a special "supplement" icon on each course page, which allows them to download the PDF file to print out.
The harmonium 200-level song courses each feature a beautiful songsheet presenting the melody, chords, lyrics, and other information for that song. A song course's "supplement file" contains a PDF of this songsheet to print out, as well as an MP3 of that song as a learning support.
There are so many courses it's overwhelming! Where do I start?
Try to identify one course to do each month. If you have more free time you are welcome to watch as many courses as you like, but especially for newer music learners, one course per month combined with some practice each day will fuel plenty of musical growth from month to month.
Start with Harmonium 101 to get oriented to the harmonium. Then do Harmonium 110 to get introduced to Sargam, the musical language from India, and later Harmonium 111 to learn the ten scales. Once sargam feels familiar, move along to Harmonium 120 to learn about major and minor chords. After practicing them for a bit, you can start learning kirtan songs in Harmonium 201.
Then you can keep learning new songs, or branch out and learn other musical topics. You might periodically browse the list of all courses and add some of them to your queue.
If I have trouble streaming the course videos, what should I do?
By default, all of our course videos are set up to play in high definition (720p). If your internet connection isn't fast enough you may experience buffering delays.
1. First, play a video. While it is playing, click the "HD" button on the video's control bar. Select "360" to play standard resolution. (If you are on a very slow internet connection, select "180" to play low resolution)
2. If "360" or "180" streams more smoothly, then as a member you can set this as your default for all videos. Click on "my account" in the top right corner, then edit your video resolution.
Additionally, to make sure you are getting the best video-streaming experience:
3. Make sure that your web browser is up to date.
4. Or, try viewing the Bhakti Breakfast Club website in today's top web browsers - Firefox (download free) or Google Chrome (download free).
If you have further questions, please contact us below.
How can I edit my billing method, or cancel my subscription?
If you need to change credit cards or otherwise edit your billing information, send us a message below. We will email you a secure link, where you can edit your billing information.
Or if you need to cancel your subscription, let us know by sending us a message below, and we will take care of it right away.