I wrote this music in early summer 2023 as the lead-in for a full album (to be called “No Other Life”). The music is a response to a number of things going on in my life, but as I began to conceive and see into existence the full project of the same name, these tracks became emblematic of its first season, and are represented in full on the season’s Spotlight talk.
“I would rather walk with a friend in the dark, than alone in the light.”
I love a good title that’s enigmatic, provokes thought, and invites a marriage of the experiences of the creator and listener.
As I sought an album title, with track titles and contents already in place, I came upon this quote from my niece’s hero. If even half of the internet quotes attributed to Helen Keller are verifiable, it would still seem a tad unbelievable that a person so experienced with challenge would beam with such optimism.
Adversity is a fact of life, and rarely shared so globally as we have seen in the past three years. During this time, my family has been learning to live with my pandemic-adjacent diagnosis of Young Onset Parkinson’s Disease. As I come to terms with words like “progressive” and “degenerative”, I am at peace with my traveling companion “Pedey”, knowing that our relationship will in fact outlive all others I hold far more dearly.
With that understanding, I ask you, why do so many of us wake in the morning and curse any part of ourselves? I instead implore us to show patience, seek love, and search for beauty in all things.
Everything, everything, teeters elegantly on one unending high-wire.
I just released a new album, Naki’s Woods, which is intended to be a companion piece to the No Other Life suite, released separately in 2023. Together they explore discovery. Whereas that earlier EP focused on discovery in a less favorable light (the realization that circumstances were not as they had seemed), this collection takes the concept of discovery a step further, in the directions of intentional exploration of self and of furthering others’ lives through joyful giving of oneself.
The movements here tell the story of a walk in the woods with a little girl, teaching her about nature, and sharing in the joy of her new experiences. Through this brief journey, her fearless leader experiences change and a realization that circumstances need not be as they had seemed.
The album is available on BandCamp. Full liner notes accompany your purchase.
