About
I’m a musician and fine artist working diligently on getting more real about who I am. Although I enjoy making a living as a graphic and web designer at Raven’s Eye Design, I feel myself evolving eventually into a career comprised more of musical recording and live performance. Surreal painting and other forms of artistic expression also entice me, but I’ve mostly set those aside for the past few years in order to focus my energy.
I’ve played saxophone for more than 30 years, and I’ve taken up several other instruments as well: piano, various wooden flutes, guitar, various hand drums, didgeridoo, vocals, synthesizers, bagpipes and whatever else I’ve been able to coax music out of. In the past couple of years, I’ve been learning the ins and outs of studio recording and basic audio engineering, and I see the recording studio as a vital part of the whole packaging of creative sound, and sort of as an instrument in its own right.
I have some notoriety as Windpipe the Clown, but I’ve mostly stepped away from that form of expression and am digging gently and ever more deeply into my soul for creativity that springs from a more authentic place within. I also am in an electro-acoustic space music duo with Rick Davies called Simple Question, which plays sporadically, but which has yet to be able to support itself even though the music is quite good.
Along with the song sketches and sound experiments I’ve begun posting to this website recently, I’m working on a growing repertoire of more polished and structured pop songs, none of which is ready for release, but all of which are teaching me about myself and the creative process. I’m working on different versions for different occasions: there will be a version with just vocals and acoustic guitar, and another version with a blend of electronic instruments and wind instruments along with vocals.
Yet another budding project promises to complement my growing career in music: Open the Lights, an electro-acoustic dream pop duo I’m working on with my partner Becca, who sings and plays electric violin, keyboard, guitar and other instruments. This project is still very much in an incubation stage, but we’ve nearly completed a few songs and I have a very good feeling about its future alongside my solo musical career.
Aside from my career aspirations, I enjoy hiking and communing with nature, yoga as fitness, bicycling as transportation and fun, watching and talking with crows and ravens, and finding myself in surreal experiences reminiscent of David Lynch movies. I walk a spiritual path, but have no interest at all in religion or dogma of any flavor.