I was born in Miami, Florida in 1965, and moved to California at the age of four with my mother, Beverly, older brother and sister. We settled down in the beautiful San Francisco Bay Area. At age seven, I was introduced to the acoustic piano. My mother also played and she passed on her love of music to me. We had a beautiful Baldwin baby grand piano that I was naturally drawn to. The curves of the piano case, the symmetry of the keyboard, plus the beautiful tone, was very alluring to me. By the time I was nine, I began taking private lessons.
My first performance, a year later was at Oak Manor School in Fairfax, CA, where the whole school was attending our Christmas holiday play. I enjoyed great satisfaction, when another student speculated, that I was faking the boogie-woogie song I was playing, suggesting it was a record. Unbeknownst to him, this “compliment” helped to build my self-confidence. By age eleven, I started composing original songs and continued taking private lessons until age fourteen. At Tamalpias High School in Mill Valley, I joined my first band, The Rebels, playing keyboards. We played mostly hard-edged rock, performing at school functions and local festivals.
In my mid-twenties, I studied music theory at the College of Marin under Tara Flandreau and extended this education through their online curriculum. Being mostly self-taught, I have a very good ear for music, love to improvise, and appreciate the opportunity to pass on this knowledge to my students.
