3q2u.com - About

About

About 3q2u?

3q2u is really just a window into my quirky little world. It's also a way for me to exercise my thoughts and make random comments outside of cultural, language, or business barriers. Plus it makes me feel good to contribute to the greater mass of editorial gunk out there in cyberspace which we all spend too much time absorbing.

3q2u is an acronym which if said in Chinese and Japanese sounds like "Thank you to you!" Dumb but easy to remember.

About me?

Hi, my name is Corbett Wall, but most people know me by my Chinese name, 高培華 (Gao Pei Hua), and I'm into the second third of my life.

I'm an Okinawan/Denver hybrid named after an old heavyweight boxer, who started traveling internationally at the age of three. I play the saxophone, have two dogs, and a wonderful wife who loves me. We all live in the mountains near Taipei sometimes, or in Shanghai, or in Beijing. It's confusing.

For the past 19 years, I've created a fantastic life here in Asia. Much more than most foreigners really ever get to see. I have the unusual distinction of being the first non-Chinese "pop star" in Taiwan. This took me all over the region and I got to travel and live a pretty happening rock and roll lifestyle. I sold a lot of records, got to wear some fancy clothes, and met a lot of interesting people; from presidents to princesses to gangsters to super models. (My buddies love it that most women over 35 in Taiwan know who I am and say stuff like "Oh, I was a big fan of yours when I was in junior high school!")

Then I got into producing, writing, and the business side of it, which took me to Europe and the US doing pop and classical music for famous Chinese artists and cool stuff like recording top UK orchestras, producing the first Grammy nominated Chinese album, creating a music label for artists to record on the world's largest piano, to selling record companies.

Later, with my wife, I became involved in a well known non-profit organization in New York, and supported the 7 Train Orchestra for Chinese and American kids in Queens, NY. We did all sorts of cool community based events, mainly to facilitate inter-cultural involvement through the arts. We took the concept back to Taiwan and I found myself fully involved for several years in children's arts education, music publishing, and artist management.

Sony heard that I was sloughing off and hadn't released an album for a couple years, signed me, and we recorded a great album for one of their jazz labels. This kept me in Shibuya and presented me with a major dilemma. Move to Japan, play with the best jazz musicians, hang out in trendy clubs, and wear expensive suits... or try to develop a better business model.

As I sat on the steps in front of Starbuck's smoking a cigar, watching the thousands of kogyaru girls pass through Hachiko, each carrying their trusty ketai around like a can of mace, I began thinking about the sake conversation I had a few weeks earlier with my friends at Docomo after touring their futuristic research center. We were discussing UMTS AD converters and the problems with transmitting music wirelessly.

That conversation got me thinking about the interactive elements of media creation, and I figured if guys like David Bowie, Thomas Dolby, and Todd Rundgren could fiddle around with technology, why couldn't I? The cigar burned out, and I haven't looked back.

I currently keep busy with a variety of projects and investments. I invented a process for distributing real-time interactive media information through mobile devices, own Taipei's coolest music venue, the Living Room, am a contributing partner for an entertainment PR firm, Entertainment Connection China, and spend a lot of time in little cities around China doing diligence for people making big investments.