View Magdalen's Live Journal

8/18/15

Greetings everyone! I have been hard at work on many personal projects. This past winter I wrote some new songs - finally! I am planning to record and release a couple of them this Spring. For those fans that have been waiting forever for new music from me I think you will love these songs. It will be worth the wait. And more songs will be on the way. In other news I bought a new house this past Spring. Renovating it has been taking up a huge amount of my time as well. It's a huge amazing early 1900's house. I will finally have enough room for both a painting and music studio.

Greane and I have been in the studio recording a couple of songs for his upcoming album "Nouveau". If you haven't checked out his music take a listen at www.greane.com. He is a fabulous singer songwriter and person and writes stuff in a similar vein as mine. Right now Greane and I are currently booking/gearing up for our upcoming Fall/Spring tour. If you are a promoter or programmer interested in booking me (or both of us) for a concert or lecture, please contact us at powrbabe at gmail dot com

Looking forward to seeing you on the road and from the stage!

Magdalen

1/16/15

Hi from Magdalen and welcome to my website!

I have been hard at work writing songs for my new album coming off a 2-year hiatus after the recent birth of my son. For my long faithful fans that have been clamoring for new music from me, I am happy to say - it's coming! The songs are finally pouring out of me and I feel I've been given a whole new lease on life. I can't wait to record and release these songs for you. Hopefully I will be able to release a new full-length album by the end of 2015. This album will be very different from my past albums, which were highly produced and laden with musical arrangements. This album will be stripped down to just piano (or guitar) and voice and string orchestration on most of the songs. I want to let the real me shine through the music and feel this minimalist approach will help elicit that effect.

The good news is - there is music and artistic life after motherhood. There was a time I didn't think it would be possible for me (as a touring musician) to be experience motherhood. I used to tour about 3/4 of every year. A life on the road is not what you imagine for your child. But you find ways to make it all work. The one thing I've learned from this experience is that becoming a parent will redefine your identity in ways you never could have imagined. It will challenge and test you in the best of ways and force you to grow as a person.

Making music and art can be a very egocentric process. When you have a child, the "I" becomes "we". You have to put someone else's needs before your own. Over the past few year, humility, selflessness, and patience have been my teachers. I've been humbled to the very core and taught that nothing in life can be taken for granted.

My book is still in progress, but has gone on the back burner a bit due to the recent influx of new songs. For my fans that are waiting for the book, I promise it will be finished someday. In the meantime I will be songwriting all winter and touring this spring. I know most of you would rather have the new music first. Again I can't wait to share these lovely songs with you.

Best,
Magdalen

7/23/13

Hello from Magdalen! Greetings. I am gearing up for another tour this Fall and have been hard at work on my upcoming books along with working on some new songs. Greane and I have been collaborating and we have some nice tunes that we hope to be able to record very soon. I know many of you are hoping to know what the books I am writing are going to be about - but for now their themes have to be kept secret. I promise you that I will reveal all about them when the time comes. In the meantime, I hope you are enjoying the end of summer. There is just the very faintest tinge of fall in the air, and I always get excited about the fall. It's a wonderful time of year, full of nostalgia and invigorating promise. Stay tuned and keep shining your lights!

Bright Blessings,
Magdalen

06/16/12

Hi from Magdalen Hsu-Li, It's been a long time since I put out a new CD. And I have been talking about writing a book for a while...

But the time has come! A new cd and book project are in the works!

You can preorder my cd and book via my new Kickstarter Project "ART AFTER BABY"...

The link to my project website is: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/artafterbaby/magdalen-hsu-li-and-greane-art-after-baby-cd-and-b?ref=email

Here's what is going on.....

Magdalen is currently working on a NEW FIVE SONG CD/EP and simultaneously writing a NEW BOOK (TOPIC TBA). The due date for Magdalen's new CD and book are by May 2013. She is currently writing the book and will begin working on the CD project in late 2012. This will be her first new album since 2005....and her first book!

Magdalen's partner and musical collaborator Greane is working on his DEBUT CD/EP. The due date for Greane's CD is by the end of 2012. He is recording his new album this July in Seattle.

Last year they were expecting the birth of their son Evan. Evan has arrived and is approaching his first effervescent birthday this July. They are doing ART AFTER BABY because alot goes into the production of a new cd or book including: CD manufacturing costs, studio & musicians fees, mastering costs, photography, website, posters, and office supplies/mailers/postage. We also are seeking a way to afford the moving expenses to move back (part time) to the east coast (Providence or Boston). We're moving back East for childcare help so Magdalen can resume touring/working again and Greane can jumpstart his touring with his new CD. Evan can safely be with his grandparents when they have to go on tour for short stints. We will still live half the year in Seattle but we hopefully will be on the East coast during the Fall and Winter.

Kickstarter is a cool new way for artists to pre-sell their creative projects. Recently it received a huge amount of attention in the national media. "Crowd-funding" has become the "wave of the future" for artists and their works. No longer do music artists have to rely on record labels to fund their projects. Their fans, friends, and family can collectively become involved in each creative project by becoming BACKERS.

Anyone can become a backer and backers will get a REWARD for funding the project - i.e. a copy of the new CD's and the book, plus lots of other great REWARDS!

Come celebrate with us as we get back into making music and BACK OUR PROJECT!

Get us back to the EAST COAST!

Spread the word to your FRIENDS on FACEBOOK and TWITTER...If you know any people with huge Facebook or Twitter followings please see if they would be willing to retweet or post about our project. The more backers...the more likely the project will get funded and be successful. We have 26 days to try to get this project funded. If it doesn't fund in the amount specified by July 12, nothing happens. We would have to start over again.

Is there ART AFTER BABY?

Help us find out!

Bright Blessings, Magdalen Hsu-Li, Greane, & Evan

SPECIAL NOTE FOR COLLEGE, FESTIVAL, OR MUSIC PROGRAMMERS.....

"ART AFTER BABY" KICKSTARTER PROJECT - CONCERT & LECTURE PRESENTATION (DISCUSSIONS ON MUSIC, ART, AND MOTHERHOOD)

In this Kickstarter project Magdalen is pre-selling her upcoming cd and book along with packages to college, festival, or music programmers who would like to back the project and would also like book her for a performance or lecture.

The link to our project website is:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/artafterbaby/magdalen-hsu-li-and-greane-art-after-baby-cd-and-b?ref=email

The ART AFTER BABY Kickstarter project is running from June 15 to July 12, 2012. During that time you can back the project via our Kickstarter website and book Magdalen and Greane for this special concert/lecture presentation. The scheduling of the concert/lecture can happen anytime within the 2012 to 2013 calendar years.

For college and other programmers I am offering an intimate, in-person music concert by Magdalen and Greane and a keynote lecture presentation/talk by Magdalen at a venue set-up in advance. Q & A at the end of the event. Students, staff and audience members can personally meet and speak with Magdalen & Greane and have a photograph taken with them. The backer will receive recognition at the event. The backers name will appear on both the book & CD's thank you/liner notes. This is a perfect event for college and conference programmers, companies, schools, civic groups, and churches. Performance and lecture excludes travel expenses and venue fees. Five free tickets to Magdalen & Greane's cd release party in either Seattle, Wa or Providence, Ri/Boston, Ma area. Five autographed copies of Magdalen Hsu-Li's brand new (currently untitled) BOOK. Five beautifully packaged autographed CD versions of both new albums - The debut CD with new songs by Greane and an EP CD with brand new songs by Magdalen Hsu-Li. Both cd's include CD inserts with artwork, photos, lyrics. and liner notes. PLUS five digital downloads of both albums, five autographed posters, & a thank-you card. Travel expenses to the cd release party/concert not included in the package.

Come celebrate with us and BACK OUR PROJECT! Spread the word to your FRIENDS on FACEBOOK and TWITTER. If you know any people with large Facebook or Twitter followings please see if they would be willing to retweet or post about our project. The more backers...the more likely the project will get funded and be successful. We have 26 days to try to get this project funded. If it doesn't fund in the amount specified by July 12, 2012 - nothing happens. We would have to start the project over again.

Feel free to forward my letter to the appropriate person or offices on your campus or email me their contact information so I may contact them directly. Email me at powrbabe@gmail.com or call 206-954-0269 to request a press kit. References from other colleges are also available upon request.

Thanks for your time and assistance in this matter. I hope to hear from you soon. Have a wonderful academic year!

Bright Blessings,
Magdalen

12/18/11

Greetings from Magdalen! It's been a while since I posted new news...with good reason! I am currently doing a new side project - writing a book about my life. This book will be out soon, possibly in 2012 if all goes well. For years I have been hearing from people who have seen my lectures and performances asking me to write a book like this....So I am answering the call and turning it into a reality. There's more new news...over the past couple of years I have been on an amazing journey....I recently became a new mother to a wonderful baby boy! Giving birth was an amazing and epic experience...one that took me to the highest of heights and the lowest of lows. It was a very difficult pregnancy fraught with many issues both medical and spiritual. But I am happy to say the baby was born this past summer and I was lucky enough to be chosen to help bring him into this world. For those of you who have been asking...that's been the reason for the year and a half touring hiatus. The pregnancy finally over... I'm excited to start touring again and will be offering something new this Spring 2011 - live interactive webinar concert and lectures! Thanks to modern technology, I can now give lectures and performances via simulcast! So far the response has been great and people really feel like I am right there with them in the room when I give webinars. And it's proven very cost effective for promoters who want to bring me but are on a budget and can't afford the travel expenses. So if you are interested in booking a live interactive webinar of a performance or lecture or having me travel to your school, festival, or conference for an in-person performance or lecture - email me at powrbabe@gmail.com. I'm currently booking my 2012 schedule. Let's hope 2012 is amazing year which smashes all the old ties from the past 4 years and allows us all to resurface, take a refreshing breath in the light, and enter our creative selves again. I ready....how about you?...

Bright Blessings,
Magdalen

4/1/09

This letter came recently from an audience member at a show. I wanted to share with you all as its a beautiful piece of writing from an very obviously creative and artistic person. It reminded me of things I went through and felt growing up in the South. It's important it is to remember that even when we feel trapped by circumstance and situation, we can always turn inward to our source - and find ways to redefine ourselves and our identities. This person inspired me with their writing and I hope I was able to inspire them with my music.

Bright Blessings,
Magdalen

"Your music and performance permeated the bleak, dreary and colorless landscape which had been filling me up all day with the vast crushing spaces of emptiness, and injected into my bone marrows a living, breathing, and moving force that undulated like waves to form a sea of torrential rage that burst me open at the seams. I had been feeling completely severed from the world and from people to such an extent that everyone seemed to have morphed into a multitude of flitting shades and shadows of Homeric Underworld. I felt lost and extremely bitter due to certain recent agonizing disappointments, which, it seems, had deposited maggots within my very core of being and they were eating me alive from within. I felt nothing.

Yet as soon as you, elegantly and effortlessly, struck the piano to claim the Muse of your songs, I was moved. Genuinely moved. I felt a surge from within, rushing through all my tendons and synapses and neurons to map onto the world. It forced me to draw a breath and, you see, that one singular, biologically-mechanized, yet spectacular breath felt like the first true and sincere breath I had ever taken in my entire life. It was like walking on a beautifully deserted beach with white, gleaming sands to tease your feet and a cool, gentle breeze to fill your lungs with unpolluted humanity.

Then you spoke of Fire, the most explosive and intense element of all elements. And I didn't feel so damn dead anymore. I felt like I could be revived and the multitude of flitting shades and shadows began to take forms, colors and shapes of the familiar membraneous soft flesh, the coveted crimson blood, and the exuberant sparks of our eyes. I truly felt like I was digging through a glass coffin, through the layers of dirt and rocks of isolation, and with bloody knuckles and what's left of a charred soul, I reached the surface. I could finally feel the life within me stirring and writhing to play its own wonted melody, much like a struggling, winter-beaten flower striving to the sun, risking even its own incineration and disintegration. I felt hopeful for the first time in such a long while, and that is a lot for a natural-born pessimist. It was refreshing.

So, thank you for your gifts to us. Thank you for your inspirational expressions. I believe that there are certain things in life which can only be captured by and expressed with even just half a note.

And today, I feel like me again.

If you were looking to connect to and to change the world, I think you genuinely achieved it."