"The music of Peace sets an atmosphere of calm and compassion, to help soothe, heal, and carry you through life's challenges. Peace was recorded as it was performed for Chris's father during his time in hospice care. This extended album consists of 5 hours of Chris's original solo vibraphone music. Dingman casts an enveloping atmosphere throughout, creating layers of ethereal sounds - poignant melodies, swirling textures, and undulating pedal tones. It's an immersive listening experience that many have described as transportive, meditative, deeply healing, and transformative."-

"As Joe Dingman lay dying from a rare heart condition at home, his son decided to try and ease his father's acute physical and mental pain.

Chris Dingman brought his vibraphone, some microphones and his laptop, set everything up in the basement directly beneath where his dad was resting, and began to play.

During two consecutive weekends, the vibraphonist recorded more than five hours of improvised solo music, something that ultimately brought peace and healing to Joe in his final days. Honoring his father's request to have what was made for him become something that could help others, Chris Dingman released Peace, a collection of the improvisations, in June.

"I think it was kind of a dream of his to see it happen," the younger Dingman said by phone from his home in Brooklyn.

According to his son, Joe was a warm, people-loving person who coached soccer and fed the homeless. He was a scientist, but loved music-mostly opera-and became an avid jazz fan when his son showed an affinity for it as a teenager. The two listened to records during dinner and together went to see shows, traveling to New York to visit the Village Vanguard and venturing out to Yoshi's in Oakland, near their Bay Area home. Later, as Dingman became a well-known performer, Joe would be there at many of his performances, even flying to different cities around the country for some high-profile gigs.

The last time Dingman's father saw him play was in Washington D.C. during 2018. He'd already received a terminal diagnosis, giving Joe about five years to live. But within a few months, he was in the ICU, fighting for his life. Doctors then predicted that he had just a few more days left. The shock of having his life cut even shorter left Joe buffeted by waves of anger and depression, adding to his physical aliment.

Somehow, Joe survived the next few days and was able to return home, where he was set up for hospice care. He and Carolyn, his wife of 49 years, had by then moved to Pennsylvania, which made it possible for their son to drive down from New York with his instrument in June of that year. Dingman had actually considered doing some community outreach by playing music for hospice patients, not realizing what was ahead for his father.

"I couldn't see him, but I kind of knew where he was at," Dingman remembered about the sound of his vibraphone resonating up the basement stairs, through the open door and into the living room where his dad could hear the music.

The nights were the toughest for his father, who at time had trouble breathing and often would wake in terror from a form of post-traumatic stress brought about by his time in the ICU. It was through those long nights when Dingman did the most playing for his father; the recordings of those moments allowed his father to listen to his son play whenever he needed to-day or night-for the remainder of his life.

The music is beautifully serene and unhurried-a few tracks pushing past 20 minutes, topping out at 45-each piece slowly unfolding and revealing a unique story.

"Because of the slower nature [of the songs]," Dingman explained, "it felt like composing on the spot. It took me some time to really hear in my mind and tap into what was coming up."

It was the first time he had ever played like this, but in a way, it was an extension of a daily ritual he's maintained for years: meditation.

"I didn't consciously do it, but I think it sort of naturally happened-to bring that sort of meditative feeling into the music, to try to help bring that to my dad, to try to bring some peaceful energy for him," Dingman said.

A few weeks after he first heard his son playing in the basement, Joe was able to express how much the music had helped him, that it truly eased the ordeal of dying and started to "open up patterns of thought and being" for him. "He said the music was 'designed' to do that," Dingman recalled his father saying.

The vibraphonist had no such designs in mind, but it's easy to see how one could hear some evidence of a noble purpose.

For that reason, Dingman's father felt it imperative that others receive this very same music therapy and began to give each of the pieces a name. Some of the titles are aspirational: "Life Without Pain" and the two-part "Healing Light." One piece, which he named "Sky," reminded Joe of a game he played as a boy, looking up and trying to discern what the clouds resembled. Together, the father and son decided on the album's name, then Dingman found a friend to design some options for the album cover, and Joe made the final selection. Now that he was helping to create Peace, Joe had found another reason to keep living as long as he could.

Eventually, though, he slipped into unconsciousness, while his family kept playing the recordings he had cherished. Three days later-on July 16, 2018-Joe died, while listening to "Sky."

Dingman hopes his album can now benefit others. He knows that because of COVID-19, many people are living out their final moments alone, afraid, confused, unable to breathe, and need something to bring them peace.

One day, the vibraphonist hopes to play for other people in hospice. But for now, Dingman's found comfort in knowing that what he's recorded still can be heard by people he might not know and cannot see. When he played in the basement for his father, he could not see him either. But he knew he was listening. Perhaps he still is."-Gary Fukushima, Down Beat