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Magdalen Hsu-Li
Magdalen Hsu-Li
is an Asian-American music artist, painter, poet, and speaker. A
pioneering Asian-American woman in music, Magdalen is one
of the first openly out bi Chinese-American singer-songwriters in
the United States who is becoming a star in the
acoustic/pop/folk/alternative genres. She is already an acclaimed
performer on the college, festival, folk, and club tour circuits,
and her music offers rebellion in sexy, soaring vocals and
gritty, angst-filled lyricism. One of the first Asian-American
music artists to command the alternative college playlist,
Magdalen brings a confident voice and an astute awareness of her role
as catalytic spokeswoman for America’s melting pot. She is opening
new doors of expression for Asian-Americans and people
everywhere, and is poised to become a cross-cultural pop icon.
Redefining her torrid mix as a woman at the threshold of
tumultuous change in America, she exposes the treacherous
currents that underlie our national fabric, and explores pathways
through which we all meet.
Magdalen began her artistic life as a painter and
visual artist. Graduating with a BFA in Painting from the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design in
Providence, RI, she won the coveted Oxbow Fellowship, Talbot
Rantoul Scholarship and Florence Leif Scholarship for Excellence
in Painting. In 1992 she migrated to Seattle, WA and became
immersed in the legendary Seattle music scene of the early 90’s.
She began her study of jazz and classical music at Cornish
College of the Arts, and was the recipient of the 1995 Cornish
Music Scholarship.
In
1997, Magdalen founded Chickpop Records. That same year she
founded Femme Vitale, The Seattle Women's Music and Arts
Coalition, a women's arts advocacy organization that won a
Special Projects Grant from the King County Arts Commission.
Femme Vitale hosted
numerous educational workshops, festivals, arts exhibitions, and
performance events around Seattle, King County and the West Coast
throughout 1996-1997. Magdalen was nominated for
a GLAMA (Gay and Lesbian American Music Award) for "Best Out
Song" for "Monkeygirl,” the single from her critically acclaimed
1998 release Evolution. The CD received airplay on
hundreds of college and commercial radio stations throughout the
US. Magdalen’s music charts regularly on the Outvoice GLBT Music
Charts.
Most
recently, Magdalen’s devoted national fanbase has made her hugely
popular on the grassroots, college, folk, and GLBT music
circuits. Her much anticipated new release "Fire" has
received rave reviews in Curve, The Advocate, Performing
Songwriter, A Magazine, Rockrgrl, Voice of America, Dish
Magazine, Alice, Girlfriends, Yolk, Bamboo Girl, and Women's
Monthly, and in hundreds of newspapers across the country.
Recently FIRE was named one of the best top 12 DIY albums by
Performing Songwriter, and won
"Best Producer" at the
2002 Outvoice Music Awards.
Magdalen’s live shows are powerful, magical, high energy events
featuring piano, guitar, vocal, and drumset duos, four piece band
arrangements, thought provoking poetry readings with elements of
comedic standup, and spiritually rousing percussion and drum
improvisations. In addition to performances, her lecture series
offers an academic side to her program, including slide
presentations of her paintings. Her talent, prowess, and skill as
a musician, singer, painter, poet, and person continues to deepen
her musical artistry with a positive, universal message about
love, multiculturalism, spirituality, relationships, and
diversity. She emerges as a new voice for an
increasingly diverse multicultural mainstream audience coming of
age in the 21st Century. She is clearly
an artistic visionary in her own right, making music and art with
all her might.
Born in America's rural South to Dr. and Mrs. George
Tze-Ching Li, Magdalen was raised in one of the only Asian
families in Martinsville, VA amid a sea of seething black and
white racial animosity, patriarchal tyranny, and conservative
consumerism. In her formative years. Magdalen
battled and eventually conquered a disability called Tourette’s
Syndrome. She recalls how hard it was growing up. "There were
cows, cornfields, Ku Klux Klan marches, and preppy debutantes,
and no Asians anywhere," she said. "To top it off, I had
Tourettes which immediately set me apart from others, and I was
experiencing racism and bigotry on a daily basis at school." "I
didn’t even know that I was an artist. I found solace and an
understanding of who I was by listing to Peter Gabriel’s music.
It was through music and art that I began to shape my true
identity and learn to accept myself for being different.”
Contact address: Chickpop Records, 117 E. Louisa St.,
Suite #422, Seattle, WA 98102.
www.magdalenhsuli.com
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