Rising Stars: Meet Tai Shan

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tai Shan.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?

I came to Nashville four years ago from Seattle.  Our rent in Seattle went from $1200 to $2400 during the time we lived there.  So my husband and I packed up and hit the road touring the country playing shows in our 13ft travel trailer. We traveled on tour over 60,000 miles from Canada to Cabo San Lucas. Doing 150 shows a year as a duo with my husband. Exploring along the way, living in a lookout tower in Montana for a bit, sitting alone in a field of Buffalo in North Dakota, and living on a beach in Mexico.

We found our home in Nashville 2018 and in 2019 we had a baby. In 2020 I released Traveling Show which was featured in Billboard Magazine. Financially I leaned into teaching Songwriting, Voice, Guitar and Ukulele remotely with my school TaiShanMusicSchool.com.

This Summer was the first time I was back on tour since the Pandemic. I left in May and came back the first of August. It was a level of Tetris I have not done before. Booking shows, wineries, house concerts, breweries and even the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Then finding a babysitter who I could trust. I had two gigs I had to cancel because it was just too hard to coordinate with driving times and logistics. But looking back, it was wonderful to watch my daughter grow. She got to see Sequoia trees and understand those are the trees we named her for. I will never forget that look in her eye when she watched her parents perform for the first time.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?

Raising a kid during the pandemic alone with no local family or daycare was beyond difficult. I would lie in bed at night worried that she would not learn how to socialize because she literally had no friends. We would try to create bubbles with other local people but the rate that people were moving home and away from Nashville made it nearly impossible.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?

I’m a music educator with fifteen years of experience. My students have performed on stages across the United States, signed record label deals, released over twenty CDs, won Songwriter of the Year (IMTA), Best Song of the Year for the John Lennon Songwriting Contest, and attended Oberlin Conservatory and Berklee School of Music.

What else? I have toured the United States, Mexico, and Canada, sung for Pope John Paul II, performed for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and at the famous Bluebird Café in Nashville.

Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?

Apps: Forscore
Cleartune
Tiktok
Spotify
Voice Memo
Find my
Paypal/Venmo
Canva
Mailchimp
Zoom
Ultimate Guitar tabs
AllStays
Ella
Clubhouse
Hatch sleep
CapCut

Podcasts
Radiolab
Song exploder
Unruffled

• First 30 min lesson is free
• $50 for 30min lesson
• $60 for a 45 min lesson
• $70 for an hour lesson
• I’m teaching a songwriting course in Setpember https://store.dustystrings.com/p-11041-sept-14-oct-5-songwriting-intensive-with-tai-shan-online.aspx $149

Contact Info:

• Website: www.TaiShanMusic.com, www.TaiShanMusicSchool.com
• Instagram: @taishanmusic
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/taishanmusic/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/taishanmusic
• TikTok: @TaiShanMusic

Image Credits
Becky Yee Kimberly Loomis