About Me
I'm not sure when I started writing my own music. One could say it was in the mid 1980's when the Mozart sonata I was assigned became a basis for improvisation instead of turning into the polished classical sonata my teacher was hoping for. Or maybe it was a few years later when some friends and I formed a jazz combo and started inventing our own tunes. Later, in college, I'd spend a bit too much practice time writing choral music that would never be performed. But officially, I suppose it started in 2005 when I couldn't find the right piece for a student and decided to write my own. I enjoyed writing it, he enjoyed playing it, and I've been writing for student pianists ever since.
I was born in 1972 in St. Louis, MO and my family moved to Springfield a year later. That makes me an 80's kid, so I grew up with the sounds of Elton John and Genesis in my ears. Favorite albums included Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and They Might be Giants' Lincoln. I was an average piano student, but I joined the choir, marching band (mallet percussion), and jazz band in high school. My sophomore year of college, I switched majors from the sciences to the arts and graduated with a music degree in 1995. I went on to graduate school at Louisiana State University and the University of Michigan. I taught at Schoolcraft College and Texas Tech University, then moved to Iowa and began a freelance career in 2008. Since then I've continued teaching, writing, and performing (mostly on the classical stage and in musical theater pit orchestras.) I still haven't decided what I want to be when I grow up.