An army brat, Tonoccus was born in Georgia, and has lived in Massachusetts, Ohio, Germany, Alabama, and Colorado before winding up in beautiful Southern California. Hes been singing longer than even he remembers. Allegedly, there is a cassette floating around in the ether of him at 3 years old singing Lionel Ritchies Trulya sap even then. Hes been singing in choirs since Kindergarten. His first was at an international school in Germany where he had to learn their entire German program phonetically...since he hadn't yet been taught how to read English, let alone Deutsch! In middle school, he began learning whatever instruments he could get his hands onflute, piccolo, clarinet, oboe, alto sax, and piano before he fell in love with percussion.
His senior year, he auditioned for Channel One News Student-Produced Week. SPW is a week in which Channel One, a national teen news program that is beamed right into the classroom, flies 20 students from around the country to basically run the show. They enlist everyone from student writers, producers, directors, and reporters. He was selected as a reporter and journeyed to L.A. to participate. At the end of the week, Channel One offered him a position as full-time Anchor/Reporter upon his high school graduation. And thats how he ended up alone, and flying by the seat of his pants in Los Angeles at 17 years old. Through the show, he interviewed Presidents and one Vice-President, rubbed elbows with bitchy celebs at the Oscars, slept on an aircraft carrier, and reported from the de-militarized zone in North Koreaall this while taking 20+ units a semester at Cal State Northridge as a double major in Radio/Television/Film and Music.
After his stint at Channel One ended he moved on to a couple music video shows on FOX Family and ABC Family. He now works as an actor for television and films and performs in movie soundtracks and commercials, most recently in the soon to be released "World Trade Center" and "Superman Returns" soundtracks as well as "King Kong" and "First Daughter"--a horrible film in which he has a big solo at the end.
As a musician, hes toured the world in companies like the Albert McNeil Jubilee Singers and the World Youth Choir. A vocal jazzer, pics and demos from his kick-ass vocal jazz quartet NuBlend can be found at www.nublend.com. A member and featured soloist in the Los Angeles Master Chorale, he performs at the recently opened Walt Disney Concert Hall regularly, as well as the Hollywood Bowl, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, and the Kodak theatre.
A songwriter as well, he is currently writing a one-man show.
He also knows practically every Disney song ever written, is a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fanatic, and does a mean Ms. Piggy.
He is loving life and can't wait to see where it's going to take him next. He is eternally grateful for all of the gifts and opportunities hes experienced. His journey is proof that we all have the power to create any life imaginable. The only truly scary thing in life is our potential.
