Michael Franti’s new project, The Soulshine Tour, was a festival roadshow boasting yoga, roots, rock, reggae and a self-proclaimed rockers healing the nation sound system. As a yoga instructor, this modern day traveling circus of healthy living integrated with playful and conscientious music, peeked my interest.

The day’s events began with a mass yoga class taught in an open, outdoor field where Franti and his lead guitarist, J Bowman, played an acoustic set. Gentle instrumentalism backed the instruction by the Portland-based teacher who designed the class to accommodate space for full songs of the uplifting variety like: “Say Hey (I Love You)” and “The Sound of Sunshine.” The songs permeated the field during series of vinyasa flows with pauses in the asanas to allow for jumping and wiggling. Franti held the spotlight throughout which began the masterful balance, embedded in the tour’s design, of shining more brightly for sharing the stage.

After a few hours the festival continued in the outdoor venue of the Britt Fest where Michael Franti and Spearhead have performed annually to a sold out crowd for years. Franti acted as a grandfather ambassador extending his influence to a new generation of musicians with 3 bands playing full sets and Sonna Rele with a “tweener” set gluing the transition to the main event. Soja, Brett Dennen and Trevor Hall were young, conscious, mindful and inspiring human beings questioning the status quo in music designed to inspire a better world. Franti joined Soja to sing their recently recorded collaboration, I Believe, but only Sonna joined Franti during his set. His intoxicating energy to unite people through music has continued to grow and the design of this tour exemplifies that. Perhaps all that yoga has helped him stretch beyond his own arm’s width and effect a far greater pool than any man could do on his own.

His first song of the night, “Say Goodbye,” repeated the words, “die and goodbye” over and over in the chorus, written after the Trayvon Martin shooting, and still had people up on their feet, jumping with arms up in the air and silly grins. By starting in the afternoon with yoga and music, then leading with four bands before he stepped on stage, the audience was warmed up, ecstatic, awake and ready to jump to a chorus of mortality and racial profiling. Brilliant! The design facilitated the opportunity to express real, potent, controversial concepts in a hospitable environment where they could be heard. He also spiked new and heavier subject matter songs with snippets of his, and other artist’s, popular and upbeat music. It was mind manipulation in the best way possible. Perhaps better phrased as mind receptivity facilitation.

Singing “East to the West” at the beginning of the night set an invocation calling to the four directions his message of one love. Songs interspersed with themes to end war, bring home the troops, be kind and love one another, end violence and prejudice, play and live fully and openly as the unique freaky people that we are, all made their way into catchy tunes. He was playful in lyrics, “All I want is you. All I want is… drums and bass!” He dissolved the boundaries between musicians and audience wherever possible: stepping into the masses, touching people, inviting children on stage, unleashing a slot machine jackpot of beach balls into the crowd for the day’s second round of “The Sound of Sunshine.”

One of the most touching moments of the evening was a personal serenade to his son, Ade, who came on stage and stood next to his father seated with an acoustic guitar as he played the song he wrote for him as he suffers with a rare kidney disease. It was awkward and beautiful to watch. It’s one thing to write music about the tragedies and injustice of a nation and world; it’s another thing to write music about the tragedies and challenges within one’s own life; it’s something else to display those people and that level of intimacy on stage with one’s 15-year-old son. Manas Itiene joined Franti with the deep beats of a djembe. Continuing with the brilliant design, they followed this powerful, moving moment with the high energy of, “Say Hey (I Love You).”

The music acknowledged the basic desire we all have to be little kids—to laugh, play, show kindness, jump, dance, act silly, ridiculous and light. Yet his songs spoke of heavy issues. There’s some darkness in this world and his hip hop, reggae, pop songs talked about a lot of it; but it was mixed right in there next to the love and sunshine. This made the message more authentic. As Buddha said: joy, beauty, brilliance and transcendence exist within this broken world. You will likely leave these shows smiling, happy and stimulated with the full possibility of an awake conscious life when you may have just thought you were jumping and throwing your limbs in the air. Bravo Mr. Franti.