biography
It was when I was going through a Mad Men phase.
I was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio.
Hell, my parents still live a couple blocks from where the Cavs play. Cleveland has a pretty rich musical history. In 1952, DJ Alan Freed hosted the Moondog Coronation Ball, widely considered to be the first rock concert. We have a museum dedicated to rock & roll music, where you can find a couple of Michael Jackson's gloves. We have one of the top five orchestras in the United States. Point being, music was a great big part of my life. I played in bands throughout high school, and taught guitar to all types of students, from kids to retirees.
Just above this section are a bunch of pictures of my musical evolution, from seventeen to today.
My undergraduate studies took place at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts, where I earned dual degrees in music production and engineering, and music business management, entrepreneurial track. From there, I moved to New York, where I’ve spent the last four years doing almost every job you can imagine in the industry. Copyright administration? Check. Publishing? Yep. Working the door at a crappy Williamsburg bar show? You bet.
However, I’ve spent the most of my professional life as a recording and live sound engineer, where I’ve logged time at places like Gramercy Post, Spin Studios, WNYC, and my own space in New Jersey. This has resulted in a lot of nights where I don’t get home until 3:30 AM. Scratch that, I did CMJ a few years ago and regularly got home at 5 AM that week. From these positions, I gained some valuable experience in the fields of music, film, and television production, though the latter two are mainly from the sound side. This led me to create my first web series, Soul Search Live, which featured bands performing live in my studio, after which I interviewed them.
My work in media production led to me wanting to pursue higher education of digital media, which is how I ended up at NYU’s Polytechnic School of Engineering, where I’m a Masters of Science candidate in the Integrated Digital Media Program. Though I’m big on UX design lately, I’ve been doing so much audio-related work that I’m probably getting pulled back in. Personally, I find the whole thing very exciting.