Everything a Little Mystic

On a humid, gauzy afternoon in the summer of 2015, I pressed publish on a Tumblr website I’d spent months designing & coding. Its first blog post was titled Something a Little Mystic, & it read like this:

Here is a formula for magic—

—or, perhaps not magic. Something almost like it, though, something very close. Something grounded in reality yet shrouded in enchantment; something that has made its home in the sparkling in-betweens. Born from stardust, bathed in sunbeams, magical and mundane all at once. A shattered epiphany of afterthought. A finite timeless paradox. Something, perhaps, that might be known as—

Half Mystic.

(Or: an independent journal dedicated to the celebration of music in all its forms. A home for creators with études nestled between their ribs and sonatas shivering beneath their spines.)

This July, Half Mystic turns ten years old. A full decade of listening to the ghosts, of dissonance & defiance, of notes slipping through our fingers like the rays of first light. A decade of stretching, arching, reaching through the grand door we opened on a hollow-boned day one summer. Through the wax & wane I return to you—our readers, writers, artists, allies, who have carried our sun-strained vision with you, built our gatherings & soundscapes, stitched the hum of tomorrow to the pages of the present.

I’m grateful beyond belief to introduce the next chapter of our organisation: The Long Crescendo, a year-long physical & digital celebration of Half Mystic’s histories & futures, the promises borne of & made to the world we’re spinning together.

On Instagram, Facebook, & X, we’re unearthing past journal issues, books, radio episodes, collaborations, events, & reminiscences of all we’ve explored & built. Our contributors take the spotlight, sharing how time’s passing has moved through their careers & how Half Mystic has shaped those paths forward. Wonder with us in response to writing prompts inspired by our twelve journal themes. Step back into the worlds of our books with quizzes & giveaways, & join the chorus to revisit the place Half Mystic found you in your creative journey.

Then mark your calendar for July 11th, 2025 in New York City, where we’ll gather to celebrate the Long Crescendo in person! Featuring the writers & musicians who have carried us ceaselessly to the brilliant now, we’ll revel in the spark of cross-disciplinary art by beloveds familiar & new. An evening of waltzing to line breaks & long breaths, toasting to velvet dusk & mirrorballs, livewire lovesongs, years stolen or borrowed, undelicious as longing & surreal in the fever pitch. We’ll remember what it means to belong to rhythm, meaning to each other.

Thank you for these past ten years of echoing back our strange desires, our untamed joys—& for opening a new score with us today. Welcome to the next movement. You are why we sing.