Three years after that pesky pandemic cut our dinner series short, I am thrilled to share that we will finally return for a limited 5-night run in May! To celebrate the release of my newest album Permission, I am embarking on a brand new kind of “tour” called The Permission Parties: a multi-sensory listening and tasting dinner series. Attendees will enjoy six Chinese-inspired dishes I’ve created that share some common emotion with each of the six tracks on the album. I will share a personal story about each course before serving, and then premiere the track while the guests enjoy the dish. The dinners will take place in Nashville in May as a part of AAPI Heritage month celebrations, and then across 9 other US cities in September and October: Kansas City, Denver, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Santa Fe, Houston, Austin, & Dallas.
Proceeds will benefit groups fighting for AAPI safety and visibility via The Quiet Voice Fund.
GET YOUR NASHVILLE TIX HERE! (5/9-5/13)
Tickets for other cities coming soon. If you’d like to host a future Permission Party please drop me a line at alex@highceilingsmusic.com
More about The Permission Parties:
The purpose of The Permission Parties is to invest in the idea that everyone has permission to take up space in the world… we don’t need to wait for it to be “given.” Growing up in the US as a second-generation Chinese American, I rarely felt permission to take up space with my body, my voice, or my stories. Movies and media told me I was allowed to be a buddy, a punchline, or a decoration, but there was not enough space for my story in the center of the room. By showcasing the emotional stories connecting my music, food, and cultural identity, I hope to empower everyone, especially those on the margins, to feel permission to take up space with their stories.
The inspiration comes from having synesthesia, a condition that mixes up 2 unrelated senses in our brains. This did more than connect colors to letters, numbers, and musical pitches. It taught me to find connections between seemingly unrelated passions such as food, music, and storytelling, and inspired me to synthesize these disciplines into a holistic artistic event in order to share these connections with others.
Music making and cooking have always come from the same creative place for me. The same elements that make music endlessly fascinating are also what drive my curiosity in the kitchen; pushing for new sounds/flavors, quiet/loud elements working together, and most of all the emotional message at the core of any creation. The way a kick drum makes my mouth salivate when it sounds just right is the same feeling I’m looking for when seasoning a dish. The way my heart flutters when the string arrangement locks into place is the same as when I taste a new combination of ingredients that really works. I’ve always wanted to express these emotional parallels between food and music somehow. My hope is that experiencing them together might offer a deeper enjoyment of each.
You can view a past listening and tasting experience here.
I can’t wait to cook for you all again!
Much love,
Alex Wong and the Angelhouse Family Dinner team