David Swenson, the ‘grand master’ of Ashtanga Yoga visits Barcelona again for courses and workshops this March
“It all began in the late 1960s, before there were yoga studios, yoga mats, yoga gear…there was only yoga,” David Swenson explained in an interview some years back on how he got his start in yoga. He was just 13 years old.
He confesses it was his brother that brought him into this world: “My brother discovered yoga by chance, on a beach while he was surfing. When he came back to Texas, we started looking for information and found some books like Richard Hittleman’s Yoga: 28 Day Exercise Plan (1969) and a bit later, we discovered B.K.S. Iyengar through his book Light on Yoga (1966)”.
3 years later, David Swenson left his family home in Texas and moved to California, where he was lucky enough to meet David Williams and Nancy Gilgoff, a couple of yogis who taught Ashtanga Yoga at a small church: “The first class I took with them was unforgettable,” David says.
David Williams was one of the first Americans to study Ashtanga. He went to India in 1970 and met Pattabhi Jois and his son Manju. A few years later, he brought them to California for the first time. “Over the four months they were there, they taught us all the time. It was a great experience,” David Swenson remembers.
His start as a yoga teacher
“I remember my first experience as a teacher was with David Williams, teaching 6- to 8-year-olds at my school, in 1975. One year later, Williams and his wife went back to India and asked me to come to Hawaii to take over his classes,” explains David Swenson.
For the next two years, David Swenson taught yoga to 40 people a day, deepened his knowledge of the Ashtanga series and saved money by working at a health food shop so he could study with Pattabhi Jois again, in his home town of Mysore. Finally, he raised the money and spent 4 months learning from the Guruji of Ashtanga Yoga, taking classes non-stop, morning, noon and night.
The fact that he learned the original form of Ashtanga Yoga from Pattabhi Jois and the great enthusiasm he has always had for teaching this type of yoga have led many to consider David Swenson one of the most important teachers of Ashtanga Yoga in the world today.
A teacher with a unique skill for teaching Ashtanga Yoga
David Swenson has always denied that Ashtanga Yoga is “only for the very fit or young” because, he says, “There have been people in my classes missing limbs, people without sight or hearing, students needing to learn better how to concentrate, stressed out business executives or professionals, seekers of spiritual life and purpose, young kids, parents, and elderly people.”
There is no doubt that Pattabhi Jois’ influence has been a huge part of David Swenson’s knowledge, but his positive attitude and the way he shares Ashtanga practice make him a unique teacher “who is warm, has an incredible sense of humour and personal connection with students, working to make their practice a pleasant, beneficial experience,” explain some of the students who have had the opportunity to take his classes.
Take advantage of this unique chance to meet David Swenson in Barcelona
This March, David Swenson will be at YogaOne Tuset teaching several courses and workshops on Ashtanga Yoga. They are open to anyone interested, regardless of their level.
The first, from 4 to 8 March, will be Mysore-style Ashtanga classes, teaching this type of yoga as Pattabhi Jois originally taught it. Then there will be an Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga weekend, on 8, 9 and 10 March, to delve deeper into knowledge and practice of this type of yoga. The weekend will have 7 different seminars (which can be attended as a pack or separately). Finally, from 11 to 17 March, David Swenson will give a 40-hour intensive course on the main series of Ashtanga Yoga, a fun, energising course.
Don’t miss this unique chance to meet a living yoga legend and Ashtanga Yoga guru.