In the sprawling landscape of my life, I’ve often felt like a bit of an anomaly. From a kid who spent hours with a violin tucked under his chin, to a tech strategist navigating the complexities of AI and cybersecurity, my journey has been anything but linear. But if you were to ask me to distill it all down to a single passion, it would be my ongoing project, which I’ve humbly named “ArtistAviator.”
It’s a name that reflects my two primary modes of operation. The “Artist” part is for the kid who never really stopped wanting to create. The “Aviator” is for the part of me that loves to build, to lead, and to strategize, a skill set I honed in the working world, where a good flight plan is everything. This project isn’t a separate career; it’s the place where these two sides of myself finally get to have a conversation.
Beginnings
My musical journey started with a childhood love affair with the violin. It was a wonderful, if sometimes screechy, adventure that taught me the fundamentals of music theory and the kind of patience that only a child learning to play a stringed instrument can truly understand. Life, as it does, took me down a different path for a while, leading me through the world of technology and corporate leadership. But the music never truly left me.
Rekindling
In my thirties, I decided it was time to reconnect with that part of myself. I didn’t reach for another violin, though. Instead, I picked up the electronic wind instrument—an EWI. It’s essentially a digital saxophone, and it felt like the perfect bridge between my past and my present. It allowed me to honor my love for instrumental music while embracing the very technology I’d spent my professional life building and advising on. I’ve even been dabbling in the beautiful, ancient tones of the Guqin (古琴), a traditional Chinese instrument, proving that my musical curiosity knows no bounds—and that I still have a lot to learn!
Painting meets music
This blend of old and new is at the heart of what I do. You can see it on my ArtistAviator website, where my music lives alongside my Chinese brush paintings and calligraphy. It’s an a showcase for my “xie yi pai (寫意派)” style, which is all about capturing the spirit rather than the precise form. In my music, you’ll hear a similar approach. I try to compose from the heart, creating a fusion of my classical past and my technologically-savvy present.
My professional life has always revolved around understanding and leveraging technology, especially in fields like AI and automation. My professional background certainly influences my artistic process. I’m a firm believer that technology can be a powerful partner in creativity, offering new ways to write lyrics and compose music. It’s a fascinating collaboration between human intuition and machine precision, and it allows me to bring my ideas to life in ways I never could have imagined with just a violin and a bow.
Ultimately, my journey with ArtistAviator isn’t about being the best musician or artist. It’s a deeply personal project about sharing my creative experiments and “ramblings,” as I affectionately call them, with the world. It’s a testament to the fact that you can be a leader in the boardroom and a humble student of the arts. It’s about finding the harmony between all the different parts of myself and, hopefully, inspiring others to embrace their own unique mix of passions. After all, the best songs, and the best lives, are often a little messy and wonderfully complex.
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