This is a blog about song and string. It’s also a blog about quitting my job and going to the Himalayas, and what all else comes after.

So why “thread of song”? There is a widespread poetic/linguistic trope equating singing (or reciting poetry–back in the day it was the same thing) with weaving or stitching. For example, the word “rhapsody” (as in Bohemian or in Blue) comes from an ancient Greek job title meaning “stitcher of song.” These were the folks who recited the Homeric epics from memory. AND, there is an actual tradition in parts of Central Asia of encoding weaving patterns as songs. I could go on, but I don’t want to bore you (too much).

As any of my friends can attest, I tend to seriously nerd out about this stuff. So: there will be linguistics. There will be archeology. There may be music theory and micron counts. Consider yourself warned. I’ll try to balance it out with pictures of yaks.