Music has been part of my life since 4th grade, when I decided to take up clarinet. Although I did not appreciate popular or classical music at that point, Soon, I gained an appreciation for the music that accompanied video games, which were no longer bleeps and blips, but complex scores. Early in junior high, an art teacher had also introduced me to the Star Wars Trilogy soundtrack, which I still love.

        During Junior High, I had discovered Nirvana. It was not long before rap and industrial came into play as well. Afterwards,I had started to play guitar along with Nirvana, Greenday, Stone Temple Pilots and other alternative/grunge bands. At this point I had put my clarinet away, and picked up a cheap guitar and small amp. I looked into the influences of the bands mentioned, such as The Bealtes, and the Ramones. I started recording immediately, into the mic of my stereo boombox.

       It was at this point I was relocated to a small town in Northeastern Pennsylvania. There I met other guitarists, and started collaborating with some. I had widened my appreciation for music more and more to encompass Jazz, Folk, and other styles. I spent the summer of 1997 roaming around with an acoustic guitar, and Neil Young's "Decade" on my cassette walkman.

       In my sophmore year of high school, I met a long time collaborator, Stephen Faubel. My recordings had advanced from a boombox to a Karaoke machine where I could record layer upon layer, until the noise and panning irregularities were unbearable. My oldest recordings date back to 1996. Steve and I played at the talent show, and in my junior year, we were working on covering the end of The Beatles album, Abbey Road. I was involved with the Jazz Band that year, and played at competitions. I also took part in an arrangement of a song from  "Mr. Holland's Opus," which features an electric guitar part.

       Soon after, my life had taken a turn into religion, and I met a collaborator named Michael Raimondi. In 1998 we recorded my original, Tafton Fields, and we later played together in a Duo named Five Minute Dream, which featured pre-recorded backgrounds to fill out our sound. It worked to an extent, but lacked the improvisation and spontaneity i craved.

       It was then my mother gave me a modest pc. It was a 233 Mhz Pentium II mmx with hardly any RAM to speak of. I started recording digitally at this point, in 1999. Over the next 12 years I had learned more and more with the limitations I had, and now have a studio in which I perform and write original music, as well as mix and arrange other people's music, sometimes from opposite corners of the earth, thanks to the internet and programs that have enabled me to take advantage of this communication.

       The program I use for recording is Reaper. www.reaper.fm