San Francisco composer and recording artist the Xman aka Charles Xavier is releasing an ambient/melodic/neo-jazz album titled Pandemic Piano on September 9th, 2022. The music speaks for itself for it is new age ambient piano music that Charles will perform as he crosses the country and live streams the tour.

He will continue his Xman drama with the first single titled “When I Think Of You” (Dolby Atmos mix by immersive mix engineer McKay Garner) on July 29th. The second Atmos single titled “Sexual Vibration Chakra” will be released on August 19th.

Says Charles, “I was creating out of my comfort zone. I improvised each morning after I had awakened from my unconscious dark shadow and I recorded endless loops of anguish and despair. I was capturing the moment until I was able to release my darkness with loving light through this piano. Isn’t that what every artist strives for? To capture our souls on fire, so that we can present to our audience the true essence of our art, engage our listeners in our battles, our conflicts with egos that are present in every man.

There’s a magic in our madness as human creatures that the superior beings that control the universe cannot predict or prescribe into ... DIG.”

1. You Know
2. Perfect Mold
3. Grand Happiness
4. Swallow
5. Covid Oddity
6. Little Portugal
7. When I Think Of You
8. Africa
9. I Sat Outside There
10. Morning
11. Evening
12. Sexual Vibration Chakra
13. Mary’s Pond
14. Stories New, Stories Old
15. Expectations
16. Ascended Masters
17. Profile Rock
18. St. John’s Cathedral
19. Round Hill

Encouraging meditation, relaxation, and mindfulness, these songs are a perfect introduction to Charles Xavier and he opens on two of my own personal favorites from the new set, the dulcet stillness of You Know and then follows that up with the gentle flow of possibility within Perfect Mold, the almost crystalline Grand Happiness, the veritably shimmering Swallow, the aptly-named Covid Oddity, and then comes the quietly flirtatious Little Portugal, the self awareness of When I Think Of You and the thoughtful Africa (no, not the Toto song!).

Up next is the delicate, almost stoic embrace of I Sat Outside There and then the perfect bookends of both the lucid Morning and the translucent Evening, and which are both seamlessly backed by the atmospheric Sexual Vibration Chakra, the effective mixtures found within Mary’s Pond, the echoing ebb of Stories New, Stories Old, the lightly jaunty Expectations, and then the album rounds out on the glassy ambience of Ascended Masters, the gentle breeze of calm brought within Profile Rock, coming to a righteous close on the intricately sculptured St. John’s Cathedral and the elegance of Round Hill (and a handful of 30 & 60 second Radio Tags).

Says Charles, “I present this new set of songs recorded during the pandemic and throughout its current state of osmosis, separation, disruption, disdain and frustration from our being separated from our commutative, tribal, creative souls. This living project began as the last six albums have but quickly took shape into a life changing force all-encompassing into oneself. I exist now as a solo human being drifting across America…”

Ambient solo piano music by composer/percussionist/sound designer Charles Xavier. Pandemic Piano is sometimes spontaneous, then magically serene, dipping into quadrants of clarity then unspoken shifting moods, pain then dreams, dreams then gain. Different pianist, different speed. It’s worth a listen.

What’s next for Charles? The show “ELLA ACROSS AMERICA” is a real-time docudrama about a Composer/musician/post-production director who separates from his wife after 30 years, he leaves a thriving Silicon Valley Suburbia named San Bruno with his dog Ella, a spiritual breed of a dog Great Pyrenees, then he travels cross country in a specially equipped RV van for capturing streaming media.

The short synopsis: “One man, one dog, one piano. He decides to leave California after his marriage ends, so he buys an RV, then sets out to explore 5,000 miles while busking & performing ACROSS AMERICA!”

In closing Charles has this to say, “Live in the present! A year ago I never would have predicted this tour to happen.”

Official Purchase Link

Charles Xavier @ Facebook

Charles Xavier @ Twitter