As a composer, I aim to set atmosphere. A very specific blend of scenes, mood, and memory that escapes easy description by language alone: like the particular mix of nostalgia, bittersweetness, and comfort that arrives with the smell of petrichor after rain. Growing up between a high-context culture and language (Chinese) and low-context ones (New Zealand and then America), I became hyperaware of where each language extends and where it falls short. Chinese can hold an entire atmosphere in a single idiom, four characters that summon a season, a mood, a moment all at once. Moving between Chinese and English, I often feel at a loss for words, or find myself piling metaphor on metaphor to chase something so precise it becomes overwhelming. I bring to music the atmospheres I cannot otherwise hold.
My process is tactile. Just as there is a physical sensation when recalling a feeling, there is a physicality of sound when setting atmosphere. I write from the smallest seed, the physicality of a single playing technique or gesture, and expand outward into an entire architecture that holds visceral weight.