Roy Parvin of Asheville, North Carolina, is an award-winning short story writer whose work has been recognized with a National Endowment for the Arts grant in Literature. Music had always been a private side gig. To avoid getting up constantly to change the vinyl, he got into the habit of recording long swaths of ambient melodies cobbled from various electronic instruments collected over the years.

But during a recent year of surgeries, writing stories proved impossible. Somehow composing music wasn’t. It could take Parvin away from his wretched present tense. One song after another, often thick with overdubs, then to the next.

Thankfully in the midst of this, the second operation took. He didn’t return to the recorded material for several months. He had the rest of his life to catch up on. Parvin also had concerns the music might be bleak, given the circumstances.

Yet the cuts proved otherwise, the overall mood carrying a faint glow, playful, with a patient, muted hopefulness. One way or another, out of pain and worry, these beguiling songs bobbed to the surface.

Parvin finally shared them with his wife, Janet Vail, who also works in publishing. “Am I crazy?” he asked, about if the songs were good. “Not crazy,” she told him. “At least about this.” Vail wanted in, mixing and arranging, adding a guitar part here and there, as well as field recordings culled from the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Then Hurricane Helene hit—no power or water for months, the project shelved until after the New Year. Yet when electricty returned, the songs were still wide open, sunny, a necessary reminder of better times. Parvin and Vail knew what to what to do with [sound/field] then. A bit of healing can go a long way. All proceeds from this album will be donated entirely to BeLoved Asheville for the good days that lie ahead.