Looking forward to a big beautiful new year and a renewed sense of musical purpose.

A few notes from the FHA on Reverb sales of the Chapman Stick:

1. I am working directly with as many Reverb sellers of Chapman Sticks as I can to ensure that they are listing their instruments fairly and accurately.

2. I have been working directly with Reverb to remove the words "The Natural" from all Stick listings. They still have quotes around "Chapman" Stick, which is annoying, but it's a work in progress

3. I have requested and received acknowledgement that Stick Enterprises will be listed as the manufacturer of Chapman Sticks to delineate them from other teflon instruments.

A few other notes would include:

4. I have found a volunteer to pick up the Chapman Stick and play it for a year. He's an 18-year old cello player that is also active in the robotics community. Hoping we can do some informal videos as he is such a great fit for this experiment.

5. I was delighted and proud to again have had the opportunity to work with Victor Bruhn and Claire Steger on Tap in Time, the longest running podcast on the Chapman Stick. While we only had a quarterly offering this year, they were great sessions including our 2023 finale which was a tribute to THE Greg Howard, I am hopeful we will be able to ride again in 2024.

6. I was able to produce 3 months of Free Hands Friday weekly offerings for 2023, but lost steam right about the time we lost Greg. I know he would want me to go on, so I will.

7. I have re-established contact with John Taggart, the original manufacturer and architect of the TAGG interface. He is open to allowing us to use this design for future interfaces.

8. Steve Sawyer crafted the most PERFECT version of the TAGG and sent me one - it is ready for prime time and I'm so hopeful we can find a way to do limited runs of these in 2024.

9. The last FHA event was a tribute to Emmett Chapman with Gary Jibilian and Rachel Flowers. While there were no FHA events in 2023. I am hopeful that smaller more regionalized Stick Meetups can be arranged in Southern California that will be free to attend.

9. I am in the planning phase of a performance in Portugal with Rodrigo Searrao and perhaps a few others in November.

10. I have been enjoying the occasional Saturday morning Chapman Stick Zoom chat and encourage players new and old to attend and collaborate.

There is no other musical community as strong, as unique and creative as ours. Let's make 2024 a year to remember.

Happy new year,

Gene

Happy New Year and thank you for everything you do Gene!

Great to see so many projects and ideas for 2024. Keep us especially informed about your thing with Rodriguo, might be interesting for EU players.
Still hoping for a major european meeting at some point in Spain, Netherlands or elsewhere!

Happy, healthy, creative New Year Gene. And that sentiment goes out to all who to take that leap of faith with their Chapman Stick , searching for sonic bliss and inner gratification.
Thank you Stick Enterprises!

Steve Adelson

Happy New Year, Gene!

Dear power brother Gene.

Thanks for such a beautiful roundup of what's happening. It looks like stick activities are a plenty this year and time seems to be saying, (in a good way), "do it now."

Lots of sticky regards to the global fam bam.

Wow, so many great ideas and projects!
Happy New Year, Gene!

Gene-- As a noob I was unaware of the existence of a Zoom chat. Can you provide details? Thanks....

More details about the zoom chat here:
https://www.stickmusic.com/live-video-streaming

Unfortunately, I never managed to participate myself ...