Sweet beams! We hope to see you at the historic Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden for our limited series of intimate monthly concerts focused on collective breath, meditation, and unity. This is music as medicine, collective ritual, and an invocation for the worlds to come.
We’re sharing this month with our dear friend and family Tate EC, a specialist of the double bass born in Eagle Rock and raised in Singapore. Tate helped to found our Living Earth series before stepping away to serve as the Events Director of dublab for just over two years. They currently are focused on sharing art, supporting community, and we’re so grateful to shower Tate with love for the art he brings into the world and in anticipation of a little something special coming out later this year.
We’ve given this micro-series the name ‘The Paradise Garden of Endless Melodies’ as a play on two references. First, as a nod to the late IASOS and his Vibrational Environments series which included an album called The Paradise Bird of Endless Melodies comprised of synth and birdsong. Second, as a love letter to the history of Paradise Gardens, and their adjacent role in both Japanese and Persian culture as sites for utopic world building.
Bring a blanket and gather in the garden with us for an evening of spacious sounds and the rekindling of something very special. We’ll have tea available for you upon arrival, a selection of Bryan’s handmade flutes for you to peruse & offer the reminder that there are no animals allowed at the Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden aside from our critter friends who nest, rest, and digest throughout the koi ponds and tree canopies.
We may still be setting up and tinkering with sounds at 5p, so pls feel free to lay and wander/wonder and enjoy the garden. We’ll have tea available and Tate will begin around 5:30p.
🎋
Tate Egon Chavez is a Los Angeles–based event producer known for championing the city's experimental and underground arts communities as a conduit between the DIY and the institutional.
As a co-founder of Living Earth and former Events Director at dublab, his work has supported projects with organizations including the Getty Research Institute, The Music Center, and Los Angeles International Airport. His cultural programming is built on a foundation in operations and quantitative analysis and his experience as a musician. He holds a B.A. in Music and Economics from UC Berkeley, where he studied composition at CNMAT.
As a musician-composer, he has scored for installations and films featured at Ars Electronica, City Digital Skin Art Festival, Aspen Shortsfest, and international film festivals, and he has performed with ensembles at The Getty Center, REDCAT, The Broad, Wende Museum, UCLA, TreePeople, California Botanic Garden, and LAX Terminal 7.
The Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden was created by landscape designer & craftsman Kinzuchi Fujii between 1935 – 1940 for Charles and Ellamae Storrier Stearns. It is the only intact example of a major Japanese-style garden created before World War II for a residence in Southern California.
The teahouse which we gather alongside is named Niko-an, meaning Abode at Two Ponds. The original teahouse was built in Japan to Kinzuchi Fujii’s exacting specifications, then disassembled and shipped to Los Angeles for reassembly in the garden. The twelve tatami mats covering the floor signified a teahouse of great importance.
Kinzuchi Fujii’s son possessed his father’s original plans and many photographs taken during the garden’s first construction. These were an invaluable resource during the garden’s recent restoration.
Though the original teahouse burned down in 1981, it has been rebuilt. Dr. Takeo Uesugi, an accomplished landscape architect and designer, worked closely with the current owners, Jim and Connie Haddad, to restore the teahouse, faithfully adhering to Kinzuchi’s original drawings, photographs and architectural plans.
We’re very grateful to Jim, Connie, Virginia, and Heidi for welcoming Living Earth to the breathtaking Storrier Stearns Japanese Garden.