A Life in Sound

I enjoyed a highly successful, productive, and impactful 15 year career as a university researcher and educator--nearly 20 years all told in the academic and practitioner worlds of democratic governance + public administration. (You can check out some of my research and academic CV here on this site.) But in my heart, I have always wanted to be engaged with sound.

A life-long consumer of music, I began to make and study it in 2015 when I enrolled in a jazz combo course with Tony Vacca at Scottsdale Community College (SCC). At the time, I just wanted something different in my life. Over next couple of years,  I realized I was ready for a  career change and that if I was going to jump from a tenured faculty position, it was going to be to pursue my passion: sound. I continued my formal study of music and jazz at SCC and played guitar for several years in Eric Rasmussen’s “day” big band.” I have studied guitar privately with Stan Sorenson, Pete Pancrazi, and Ray Lebert.  I also have volunteered at Arizona's jazz club, The Nash, staffing the bar, box office, and I had the opportunity to do marketing and communications work with the magnificent Phoenix Chorale during the 2018-2019 season.

During the pandemic year-plus, I wrote, recorded, and produced “Complicated Memories",” an album of original “chamber pop” music—infused by elements of jazz, minimalism, folk, noise, ambient, and rock. This re-ignited my interest in recording and audio, and helped make my next step clear. So: I completed the program at the Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences (CRAS) in October 2022, including a studio internship at SER Soundworks.

As my work and sense of myself as an artist evolved, however, my focus has shifted away from music and into the world of sound art and sound composition. This work centers on the sonic explorations of desert, and especially desert riparian, soundscapes. My artist statement talks about this in more detail.

I continue to compose and perform music and work in live sound support, theater audio, and sound/field recording. Please reach out to me via the contact form to explore collaborations.