Free Planet Radio - Sunflower Code (2026)

Asheville musicians Chris Rosser and River Guerguerian are celebrating the 25th anniversary of their band Free Planet Radio with a concert on October 10 at Ayurprana Listening Room in West Asheville, together with the release of a new album, Sunflower Code. The band plays its own fusion of world music, jazz, and classical compositions, and the show will also pay tribute to its third co-founder, bassist Eliot Wadopian, who died in September 2021.

All three came to Asheville from different directions. Rosser, a jazz pianist and recording engineer, moved from Charlotte in the mid-1990s, helped fuel the local singer-songwriter scene, and produced hundreds of albums; he also studied Indian music (the sarod and tabla) under master Ali Akbar Khan. Guerguerian, raised on Middle Eastern music, studied at the Manhattan School of Music and played free jazz in the Music Under New York program; in Asheville he founded the now-famous Friday night drum circle and the Asheville Percussion Festival, built a music program at Odyssey Community School, and continues to teach through Asheville Rhythm. Wadopian, a local native and Berklee graduate, spent decades performing with the Asheville Symphony, taught at universities, and won two Grammy Awards as a member of the Paul Winter Consort.

The trio came together around 2000 at a Billy Jonas concert at the Diana Wortham Theatre, where they immediately found a shared philosophy: music should be authentic and bring love and light into the world. Work on the new album began in 2020–2021 and followed a different method than before: a drum composition served as the starting point, with a melody added afterward, whereas Rosser used to bring a finished melody and form, as in a jazz piece. In May 2021, during a live stream with vocalist Jane Kramer, the band played its still-unrecorded signature piece, “Sunflower Code.” After Wadopian’s death the project was set aside for about a year: the loss left an enormous void that took time to get through. When they returned to the album, the musicians realized the song didn’t work without Wadopian and turned to the recording of that live stream. The bass was too quiet there, so Rosser separated the recording into stems with de-mixing software known from Peter Jackson’s film “The Beatles: Get Back,” raised the bass, and reassembled the track. As a result, three of the album’s nine pieces feature Wadopian. In addition, Rosser and Guerguerian now use their voices more for rhythmic syllables, and two pieces were written for their longtime collaborator, Indian classical dancer Aparna Keshaviah, who will perform at the concert.

The secret of their creative longevity, the musicians say, is constantly inspiring each other: they never chased streaming or sales numbers. Guerguerian keeps around 400 “tappable” sound objects in his studio, which he says keep him young. The concert will feature bassist Jake Wolf, fiddler Casey Driessen, vocalists Jane Kramer and Lillie Syracuse, multi-instrumentalist Adam Maalouf, and the Asheville Rhythm drum collective.

Tracklist:
1. Free Planet Radio - Doug from Appalachistan
2. Free Planet Radio - Through the Fog
3. Free Planet Radio - Churning the Waters
4. Free Planet Radio - Echoes of a Dream
5. Free Planet Radio - Saraz
6. Free Planet Radio - Odyssey Thirteen
7. Free Planet Radio - Saida's Motorcycle
8. Free Planet Radio - Karsilama Variations
9. Free Planet Radio - Sunflower Code (Live)