ABOUT

 

Maybe this sounds as if its a press release, the beginning of Shaking Shanghai; an Oklahoma based record label dancing into the brains via globe spanning pop. Oh yes, how did it begin? Why Shaking Shanghai? In Shanghai, while running a boarding school when I had lost my ache to create and was more than ready to get on with my middle life – Middle! Be in the middle, stay away from the edges. Be professional! Run a school! 

A young man, a Chinese violin prodigy, entered my office, though I knew not that he was a violin prodigy. He. to me, was a student seeking help in English. He came to my office everyday at lunch with questions about prepositions, misplaced modifies, gerunds, participles. On one of these visits, I learned from a Chinese teachers that this young man who used the moniker Haffijy was an accomplished violinist. This piqued my interest though I was no longer making art. He brought his violin the next day and played. Immediately I realized I had that thing that few people have, that gift, a depth of emotion in his playing, an angel or something angelic communication or being free to be a vessel for a muse. I heard it, embraced it, and it rang  and sang in my ears and in my should.

He shook me. He shook me in Shanghai.

Naturally, this label is an accidental but fateful as the meeting with Haffijy. Shanghai Shook me. Shanghai will shake you.

Naturally, Shaking Shanghai is the name.

Tyson Meade.