about my process

My grandfather was a working musician. He made ends meet by keeping various factory jobs like working in a tannery or french fry factory, for a time delivering milk and also driving big trucks around the greater Philadelphia area. But, deep down, he was a musician. There was a time when he played drums at clubs where the popular bands of the day, like Benny Goodman’s Big Band, would come after they finished their sets at the bigger venues in town. He could play the drums, piano, guitar, banjo and trumpet equally - and of course he could sing. He knew so many songs, mostly jazz standards of his day, and would play them on the piano until age got the best of his technique. He was and still is one of my most influential musical idols. He couldn't help making music - it was who he was.

My beginnings also came from the time I spent visiting his house in Camden, NJ growing up. I would hear a song in my head and try to figure it out at the piano - I never noticed how much time I spent doing it. Possibly I was bored out of my mind because back then kids were seen and not heard! No one was there to entertain us so I found something to occupy my time while the grownups chatted. He would always say "keep practicing" when I started playing viola and getting more serious about music. I loved hearing him play the songs he loved. He had a way of singing and playing the piano that was so quintessentially his own voice.

I taught myself guitar when I was 17. I was obsessed with the idea of owning an acoustic guitar, so I saved my money and bought a steel-stringed Seagull which was a really big deal to me at the time. College was a busy, and complicated time— trying to figure out my own way in a big, out-of-state school far from home (UNC-Chapel Hill), debating whether I would study music or "liberal arts" or get really serious about lacrosse... and in my spare time, I would teach myself tab. I was self-educating everything Beatles, so I borrowed my dorm-mate's book with all of the White Album tab and taught myself Blackbird. From there, I learned more about finger-picking and eventually learned banjo and the ukulele later in life.

I’m interested in playing new instruments that I’ve been wanting to master in my own way, like the banjo- it’s an instrument that has a rich tradition, but I come to it with my classical viola background and self-taught technique. I'm not interested in trying to emulate traditional ways of playing these auxiliary instruments, but instead I like to detune them so they sound a little weirder, and I can create my own sounds that are unique to me. I'm constantly wanting to stretch my abilities and give myself more things to do - how many instruments I can play at any given moment? I love to give my feet things to do in a lot of newer songs, and I try to incorporate foot tambourine or bells that I can hit with my toes. It's fun to try to coordinate it all! I'm comfortable right at that edge of control.

I’m very inspired by music that I like to listen to and the sounds that surround me. I'm drawn to authenticity no matter what form it comes in.