Leaves murmur in the wind as you walk out of the village center.
A herringbone-brick path runs past the few closed shops and colorful banners hung from balconies. Crocheting on her stoop, a silver-haired vendor smiles to you from beside a generous bowl of miniature stuffed cacti.
Each step, the tower of the moon approaches.
Partially collapsed centuries ago, the spire still stands an upright splinter, a beacon atop the mountain, rebellious though no longer imposing.
There’s no way past the wrought-iron gates set into the retaining wall, but you peek through them anyway. Tall grasses, stone remnants.
On the ground: a green fruit, tomato-like, catches your eye.
It’s pristine but unripe, fallen from the tower’s most loyal companion: a tree brimming with persimmons. Clouds of royal green sporting dots of autumn.
Wandering under its canopy, you spot a bright orange persimmon above — way out of reach. But pulling down a connecting branch lets you just barely clasp its round, plump underside with your other hand.
The fruit is so soft, it splits apart with a pulpy tear (half of it still attached) . . . then sling-shots away from you as the branch rebounds.
The persimmon fruit hums from within: a forgotten melody, of something luminous.
// Side B //
// note: there’s a gift announcement 1 section down 💌 //
Thank you for tuning in! You heard 1) “Honey and Spirits” mid-story followed by 2) “komorebi” at the coda.
1) “Honey and Spirits” — off the newly releasedTravel Poems 3, featuring drums effervescent by Nir Sabag from 1:40 onwards1 — is the only song I’ve chickened out of playing live 🐔.
But not because of the song.
Travel Poems shows are a mix of compositions, improv, soundscapes, and spoken stories — rewritten each time we feature a different special guest. Each run of performances I draft a new stage-direction cheat-sheet listing each performer’s stage entries + exits:
That’s the set-1 script from our October 6 album-release show — featuring a dancer, Camille Jackson, for the first time:
Photo of Travel Poems Album-Release show, Oct 6 — (left, out of view) Giacomo Tagliavia; (middle) Camille Jackson; (mid-right in back, out-of-focus) Nir Sabag. All TAIMOM exhibition photos by Shamsul Arifin.
Why have I wussed out of playing “Honey and Spirits” live, twice? Because I always planned the Booty Story before the song, and in the moment get too scared to tell it. With an embarrassed side-eye to the other musicians on stage, I sheepishly omit song and story and so we skip to the next feature. ’Cause here’s how the Booty Story starts:
My favorite kind of phone call is the booty call [mime raising phone to ear].
Especially when it’s someone I really like, but it’s too early to tell them that.
I think a good time for a booty call, to make one or receive one, is when it’s snowing outside . . .
Harrowing, right? Well, I’m proud to announce that, even though it took all 7 years of Travel Poems’s trilogy to release, the Booty Story has as of now been performed for a live audience 🐣.
While we wait in the wings for a properly mixed video, here’s a clip of another story-music pairing2:
2) “komorebi” is a ~7-minute excerpt from September 26’s morning piano.3
Side A’s photo is from Sovana, Italy, taken after our 5-day exhibition wrapped. You’re looking at Aldobrandesca Fortress and the actual-named “Tower of the Moon”, near a 15th-century church built on the ruins of an even older 11th-century Etruscan church sporting a crypt from the 7th century — interior shot:
Do You Remember When Music Was Magic?
I’m gifting you the latest album.
Travel Poems . Chapter 3 . There is no path back will be sent to all Campfire Sparks subscribers for free. Note: that’s subscribers as of November 11 — at press time,them’sthe future — so if you nudge a friend into joining us by then, you and I are both gifting them the album 🔮.
I’ll take a group snapshot of us all on that date, then send you an email under separate cover with a private download code just for you.
Last week, these words brought me tears:
From the talent, inspiration, and creativity of Contemporary Jazz and Classical pianist and composer Eric Pan, Bluebird Reviews was delighted to review one of the most original, imaginative, and musically breathtaking albums of 2024.
Travel Poems, the gargantuan 3-CD new project of the Taiwan-born artist, associates the powers of music and memories in a wonderfully and effortlessly cohesive style.
You should purchase the limited-edition trilogy if you like beautiful objects. Now that all 3 albums are out, the set is available in digital and physical — but only the boxset includes surprise gifts you can hold in your hands: 1 heartfelt, 1 useful, 1 mischievous, 1 mysterious, 1 unique, 1 sensible . . . and signed copies are also available.5
now boasts 15 contributors and counting. It’s collaborative, interactive fiction at Substack’s finest: each writer grafts new dimensions onto a bifurcating journey where the dead-ends are quick and undo-able, following the spirit of that font of timeless literature known as Choose Your Own Adventure.
, for inviting me to join! I immediately sensed that participation would be not only mandatory but also musical. It’s been a delight to traverse the previous entries in the tale, then extend the story with fun, slightly spooky sprinklings (and other melodies).
Start from the beginning of StoryVerse and make an impressive series of wise (?) decisions to end up at the following junction — then choose carefully! I had a blast putting together all 3 episodes.
Excerpt of my contribution to StoryVerse (node 28)
Who’s the captain of this ship and where are we sailing? Thank you to Alex for the romp and for the poetic honorific:
And over in the realm of the living, Eric Pan continues the musical riddle (28/30/31) and expands it into something wonderful, but listen for yourself.
🎃
8 Harsh Lessons + 8 Cool Takeaways From Making The Weeklong Exhibition, Album Release Show, And Concert Series — Leading To 4 Actions I’m Implementing Immediately
My life flipped upside-down for seven weeks.
Each day I settle a bit: a dust cloud returning to earth.
I learned oodles from The Air Is Made Of Music: all the stuff that goes into putting on a weeklong event series unified around a final release show. Now that I’m on the other side, I’ll share 8 lessons hard-won, then 8 celebrations of success, followed by 4 immediate actions in response to it all:
The Harsh Lessons
Lack of organization is a bomb waiting to explode.
I blithely thought “I’ve got this” all the way to 2 weeks before Opening Reception.
I was wrong. I was completely overwhelmed.
All my list-making systems broke down as I careened from one crisis to another — some new deadline for writing, printing, communicating with collaborating artists, website and socials, organizing a team to handle the bar, sound recordings, materials for installation . . . surfacing suddenly and for long enough to postpone other critical tasks.
I delegated poorly or not at all, had assembled a team of too few, wasn’t even organized enough to ask friends for help with enough lead time. The most glaring consequence of this: invitations to visitors and press did not happen until 10 days before the event — a total travesty.
Next time, I’m hiring a producer or project manager and mapping out together the timeline and breadth of all sub-systems involved starting over 3 months in advance — including a save-the-date 2 months out.
I was constantly worried about the 5 collaborating artists. When things became truly hectic, I (only sometimes correctly) saw myself dropping the ball when it came to communications with (and assistance in promotion of) these stellar souls who were interpreting the songs/postcards of Travel Poems through their own mediums. I kept wanting to be more on top of that — but such a “wish” doesn’t solve the issue.
This got worse when 10 collaborating musicians also hopped aboard.
In the future, prevention is key, but this situation calls for honest appraisals with myself about what’s happening, plus what’s realistic, followed by transparent messaging to the crew, no exceptions.
This one’s a doozy. While still co-ideating a beautiful vision brimming with art and music, I started wondering, “how can we fill the space and the schedule with other things that are also awesome?”
Chalk that up to attention-deficit disorder — and the lack of project-oversight personnel on the case from day one. I thank my lucky stars two angels emerged at the eleventh hour:
Josephine Pia Wild, who helped clarify what the purpose of TAIMOM was (which led directly to the essay in Issue 24). Her most helpful razor was: When a member of the press visits the exhibition at any point during the week, when they walk away, do they have a single, unmistakable idea of what happened, and what is that idea?
Brian Trahan, who helped craft the vision for the music programming and whom to invite. Bands playing their own songs didn’t make nearly as much sense as a series of improvisatory concerts with me in live collaboration: exemplifying the air being indeed made of music, and tying together the exhibition to Travel Poems like spokes on a wheel. The epitome of the execution of this plan would be an entire line-up of musicians I’ve never performed with — which is what happened.
The interactive viewers’ photo gallery, with work-in-progress Travel Poems book
Should’ve taken care of myself.
One week before Vernissage, my nutrition and sleep and exercise went off a cliff.
Don’t dwell on the bad stuff.
The best way to handle missteps and setbacks is action. Taking time to reflect is also great. Last, treasure all the things that went well.
The very impulse to conjure grand things causes shockwaves.
Believe in this more.
Your initiative is not limited to what you think things might be. They’re infinite, because creation is infinity manifest — so allow them space to soar to realms unknown.
This is a mindset, yielding immediate, palpable real-world effects.
Sharing (process) is important.
The day before Installation was reserved for packing and transport. It ended up so long and intense, I broke my streak of posting my “What I played + wrote today” series. Proof of Play had been going strong for over 250 days at that point (and is now still on hiatus).
I’ll dedicate room to write about Proof of Play and the wider lens of life/work/fear balance; for now, the summation is the more dialogue we have around art, its value, and our diverse relationships to it, the better — and the less isolated we are.
All organization needed, every mission small and big, keeping life in healthful balance . . . the more clarity, the more effortless each step of the journey.
The best thing? Clarity’s tangible + achievable. I’ll illustrate one surefire way in the “Immediate Actions” section below.
The Cool Takeaways
First off, jesus christo, it happened.
We pulled together a majestic, cross-disciplinary extravaganza involving over a dozen artists and musicians, all responding creatively to the music and words of Travel Poems, creating totally new work in live collaboration, hosting hundreds of visitors, myriad sessions and interviews, capped off with an epic album release.
Sometime during Day 5, Eric Pan on piano
Immersive Audience Engagement.
Visitors not only explored the intimate smell stations and gigantic charm mural and diverse projection works — but also stayed to hang out, taking their time with contributions to the Flying Piano Tree, entering the Teleporter Phone Booth to be transported, and curating the viewers’ photo gallery spread out over a light-table — answering our invitation to explore the intimate bonds between music and travel.
One of 50 flying piano tree contributions
A Gathering of Unbelievable Talent.
Acclaimed artists and award-winning musicians joined enthusiastically, showcasing an infectious level of commitment amid the experimental, impromptu setting.
I am so grateful to all the collaborators, for their faith in the project and in me: to me that’s the most valuable treasure of all.
The art and music, whether prepared or live, felt anchored in clarity of intention rather than veering into randomness, abstraction, or esoterica.
Podcast and Art Movement Potential.
The event inspired the development of an ongoing TAIMOM podcast, a global and collaborative art movement with clearly actionable paths to the next stages, and a platform for provenance-tracking of musical and artistic contributions to the Taimom Collection.
(Left) Davis West on violin, (middle) Eric Pan on piano, (mid-right) Hans Bilger on bass
The Power of the Live Venue.
Ideas I’ve nursed about running a venue or other sorts of cultural programming now come into sharp focus. It’s so much easier to see what’s required for a thriving brick-and-mortar operation — including what attracts crowds, encourages them to linger, what types of advertising and merch resonate, how revenues and expenses itemize, etc.
The Elements of a Great Team.
I now know exactly the traits I want in those I collaborate with across varying layers: artistically, logistically, managerially. I’m better informed about what roles are needed, when, and what to handle myself versus delegate to others.
Giacomo Tagliavia on bass
What Is Dreamt, Can Be Made Real.
This gift is a big deal.
We imagined, then made something that doesn’t exist much: an art exhibition centered on music that magnifies both, engaging the public’s sense of wonder and inspiring their care, attention, presence.
Its subversive undertones are extraordinary, too.
Back in Issue 19, in response to Chris Dalla Riva, I tried to make my best case for putting elbow grease into creating more demand for music, rather than merely adding to supply: through novel Live Happenings that aren’t your typical concert (or art gallery with a violinist added superficially, or burlesque show, or other “known” category).
And now we did it. If this independent musician can put his money where his mouth is — on a shoestring budget — where are the millionaires? And the labels?
We’ve crossed a rubicon. No return. There’s artists + musicians + audiences to empower — and the future to create.
Lots to announce! For now, we start simple:
Daily Writing: 90 minutes each morning.
This is the fastest path to clarity — both for projects and for mission and to find out which actions need attention and why and how.
If I had written each morning, the months leading up to The Air Is Made Of Music, so much time, energy, money — and anxiety — could have been spared. It’s worth noting this item also ushers along the next ones, like a mother helping ducklings across a river.
Publishing More.
Our newsletter schedule got topsy-turvy — thank you, dear reader, for weathering the hiccup with aplomb!
But it’s not just Campfire Sparks needing a frequency of publication, it’s also my backlog of essays to write: on art, on work, on love. They keep accumulating, never embarked upon, because I catch expectations, then fear failure.
Begone. Let’s tick our way down the docket.
Weekly Planning.
A calendar of what can be achieved in the following week, when mapped out on Sundays, helps me invaluably. Where this really shines is for tasks requiring lots of energy to switch in and out of. For me: what to eat, messages and calls, social-outing interactions.
The Two Halves of Each Day.
I’m happier when I separate each day into two blocks.
The negotiables are derived from the weekly calendar: these are realistic tasks I can achieve in each day. Ideally the fewer the better to reduce context switching, but sometimes quantity is unavoidable.
The non-negotiables include ample sleep, walking outside, piano, food, lovely people, language lessons . . .
Because the negotiables have a wild-card nature — sometimes projects take more time than planned, or some piece of technology isn’t behaving well, etc. — a time limit and boundary set in advance for that block is essential. And so the grand finale of this point is that even if negotiables are planned but cannot be finished as anticipated, the block ends anyway, and I skip ahead on my merry way.
Proof of Play Season Finale
Four entries to round-up Season 1 of Proof of Play / Open Studio! It began as an experiment in opening the pod-bay doors — partly just to prove to myself that I could publish daily. The way forward points to ever-more radical transparency: stay tuned.
We continue traversing the parallel universe of secret music, for paid subscribers.
The thread goes deeper, following the last two issues. After introducing the source material, then demonstrating a piano adaptation — now we reach a curious twist.
I think of this as a level-one transformation, already versatile enough for an astronomical array of possibilities:
