siteSince the age of two, I have wanted to play the drums. A big part of my music career has been as a percussionist, and it was through percussion that I started with contemporary classical music. It was also the catalyst for my exploration of many other kinds of music, and I was quite active as a performer until recently.
As a child, I moved between classical percussion and jazz drumming, thanks to the influence of my teacher, Trevor Brandenburg. Because the classical percussion repertoire is largely modern, I had an early exposure to twentieth-century music, and I always liked it. I had had relatively little experience with the classical Western canon, so I never learned the misconception that modern classical music is different, weird, or “difficult”. Also being a percussionist, I didn’t focus very much on pitch aspects of music until my later teens.
After high school, I decided I would study jazz drumming, so I enrolled in the jazz program at Grant MacEwan College (GMC) in Edmonton. Brian Thurgood, my teacher at GMC, encouraged me to polish my technique and work towards a professional level of performance. I enjoyed this challenge, and my playing improved tremendously. However, the more I refined the skills I had in jazz and pop, the more I was curious to learn about other kinds of music. I was especially interested in Cuban music, and studied privately with Cuban percussionist Mario Allende for several years. I also took some courses at the University of Alberta on Ghanaian Ewe music.
The Cuban studies in particular had an influence on me, and I eventually ended up studying in Havana (see Curriculum Vitæ). My curiosity for exploring new kinds of music also led me to start composing. I started out doing arrangements for bands I played with, then eventually began composing my own songs. Gradually I became more interested in learning how to write for instruments I didn’t play and that weren’t normally part of the jazz/pop ensemble.
After moving to Toronto in 2002, the demands of my compositional career prevented me from doing much performing. Since that time, most of my performance projects have been based around free improvisation.
