I was born in Brooklyn NY but I grew up in the Long Island City/Astoria area of Queens NY. I’ve been nurtured, musically, by a wide range of styles, from Motown to James Brown to BB King to a wide variety of gospel music, traditional and contemporary, to a healthy helping of classical music, lots of jazz, blues, music from the Caribbean, South America, rock, pop and soul.
I had lessons, as a youngster, with a number of private piano teachers, continuing formal music studies at the Preparatory Division of the Mannes College of Music in NYC, where I played French horn, studied ear-training, music theory, and played in the Young People’s Orchestra. I attended Indian Hill Music Camp in Stockbridge, Massachusetts and eventually took on the duties of choir director and keyboard accompanist at the Greater Trinity Baptist Church in Long Island City.
I graduated Fiorella H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art in New York City and attended colleges in Binghamton, Brooklyn and the Bronx, NY. During those hungry years, I did some singing with the Oratorio Society of New York, the Bronx Opera Company, the Bel Canto Opera Company and the New York Grand Opera Company Chorus, eventually becoming a music educator in New York City public schools, and finally becoming the father of two bright, talented, creative, artistic and imaginative daughters, Rebekah and Hannah.
I’ve worked as a church musician, organist, occasional vocalist, accompanist, composer, arranger, coach, sideman, bandleader, and soloist in and around New York, the USA, Europe and the Caribbean. I play piano, keyboards and organ, and enjoy recording my own experimental music, as well as playing with the many groups, bands, artists and ensembles that I've been privileged to assemble & work with, and sit in & perform with, in New York City and the surrounding communities, around the country, and occasionally, overseas.
Preferred Styles:
Jazz, funk, gospel, blues, classical, pop, rock, R&B, Latin & Caribbean styles.
Performed and/or Recorded With:
The Toys; Chuck Jackson; Ray Schinnery; Lilias White; Bo Diddley Jr.; Louis Lymon’s Teen Chords; Vito Balsamo & the Salutations; Cuba Gooding & The Main Ingredient; Fred Wells; Michael Hill; Damon Mendes; Cheryl Pepsi Riley; Gwen Laster; Tonni Smith; Billy Grant; Chardavoine; Bobby Curtis; Hot Damn Band; Paula Atherton; Sherman & Greg; Felicia Collins; New York Players; Mark Bowers & Lil' Bastad; 747; Bill Jacobs; EJ Sharpe; Michelle Zangara; Jimmy Norman; Sharaye White; Yewande; Reggie Woods; Blue Magic; Aj; MelSoulTree; Crispin Cioe of the Uptown Horns; Steve Horton; Dave Scott; Emilie Davis; Glenn Jones; Mikki Howard; Bobby Harden; Sara Carbone; Nozomu Ito; Jeremy Cole; J.J. Sansaverino; Charles Compo; Gordon James; Jené; Cleve Douglass; Frank Senior.
Venues:
Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Radio City Music Hall, The Beacon Theater, The Bitter End, The Sugar Bar, Penang (NYC), Westbury Music Fair (Long Island, NY), Valley Forge Music Fair (Devon PA), The Breakers & Mar-A-Lago, (West Palm Beach FL), Atlantis Paradise Island Resort & Casino (Nassau, Bahamas) Bayerischer Hof Munich, (Munich, Germany), Scullers Jazz Club (Boston MA).
