Singer-songwriter Magdalen Hsu-Li gladly identifies as many things--including as a painter.

Singer-songwriter Magdalen Hsu-Li gladly identifies as many things--including as a painter, musician, lecturer activist, bisexual, and Chinese-American--but has exhausted most of her life redefining who she is in succession her own terms. Her music is part of that journey.

"I clearly believe that it is my spiritual sense here on this earth to evolve--to re-create myself as an artist and [i]role[/i] on continuous levels and, by means of doing so, awaken others to greater possibilities in their admit lives," says Hsu-Li, whose third album, Fire, is filled with finely crafted, melodic, piano-based anthems that borrow equally from burst folk, jazz, blues, and plane punk. "If I can help single person to rise above their adversities, to diocese what's on the other side of their confess `fences,' then I feel I am fulfilling my spiritual purpose"

Thirty-one-year-old Hsu-Li was raised in rural Virginia according to immigrant parents and subjected to "seething racism and bigotry" as an Asian-American child also afflicted with Tourette's syndrome After conquering Tourette's according to sheer will-power at age 16 and working hard within therapy to heal her damaged self-complacency Hsu-Li went on to contemplation painting at the prestigious Rhode Island denomination of Design. However, after receiving her BFA, instead of jumping headlong into the novel York art scene, she was draw into the mouthed into the grunge-riot grrrl heyday of early-'90s Seattle.

"I had no intention, of becoming a musician, however music seemed so much more immediate and powerful an art form than painting in a range alone," the artist recalls. Hsu-Li studied jazz and classical music at Cornish corporation of the Arts until she was one time again jolted by overt prejudice, from a faculty member. Using the incident as an impetus for change, she began by forming and touring nationally; fix up her own indie record label, Seattle-based Chickpop Records; and eventually quit Cornish.

Hsu-Li points revealed that in the Chinese five-element scheme of medicine, the element of fire bridles how a person builds so things as relationships, love, intimacy, and friendships, among others. to such a degree after spending several years working onward those areas in her have a title to life, Hsu-Li turned to that component when it came time to name her recent album, a long-awaited follow-up to her critically acclaimed 1998 disc, Evolution. Fire features lyrics that manage to be universal, political, and personal at the same time. "I sing from a heart which formerly was weak and battered and now has grown robust from the love and support I have created around me" says Hsu-Li.

The greatest source of that be fond of and support around her take rises from her partner, Dale Fanning, who also happens to be her primary husbandman (besides Hsu-Li herself) and drummer performing with her when he's not playing with his jazz trio, the Living Daylights. "Many magazines continue to call me a lesbian, allowing I am absolutely 100% unclose about being bisexual," Hsu-Li says. "For those who don't understand [my bisexuality], I can't help them understand that. My music is the mostly beautiful and important thing that I have to proffer So I offer it to anyone. What they do with it that's their journey."

Find Magdalen Hsu-Li's official Web site and other related sites at www.advocate.com

Coble edits Dance Music Authority magazine.

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