I began playing the guitar at the age 15. Kings Park, Long Island is where I called home. My first teacher was some old guy that wouldn't teach me anything I wanted to learn. He insisted I learn only what was in Alfred's book 1. After not wanting to show me a Zebra song, I gave him the boot. He lasted 9 months. After finishing high school I went on to study classical at a community college. After 2 years, I decided to check out the scene in Boston and attend Berklee College of music. Here I met a buttload of cool people, and a buttload of wackos. Cool people and great players...Joy Basu, Tom Cataldo, Terry Syrek, and Chris Pisano. Most of my teachers seemed to hate everything that wasn't jazz. The only exception was Jon Finn, my private teacher. Amazing player, amazing teacher. My stay lasted about as long as everyone else's, one year. I recorded a bunch of tunes while I was there and decided the school thing was not for me.

   After returning back to NY, I started teaching at FocusII guitar centers. I put together a demo with the songs I had recorded at Berklee and sent them to Mike Varney. In June of 1990, Mike gave me a write up in Guitar Player magazine. He then asked me to record a tune for Shrapnel Records release, "Ominous Guitarists from the Unknown"....stop laughing. Anyway, at this time I also played in a project called "Mott Street Devil" featuring John Macaluso(TNT) on drums, and Mike Grossman(?) on bass. In 92' I sent the "Mott Street Devil" tape to John Stix who gave me some sweet words in the November 1992 issue of Guitar for the practicing musician. During this time I also appeared in KERRANG!(April 1992), G-Force, Holland's Meltdown(October 1990), Milwaukee Rocks (November 1992) and a book called "The Modern Guitarist" by Matt Williams. I received radio airplay in NY and Europe. Most humorous airplay....my instrumental version of "Frosty the snowman" was used as the outgoing message at the offices of Mike Varney and Shrapnel records. I recorded my last instrumental in the beginning of 93' for Steve Blucher at Dimarzio. The tune was called "Not that kind of a Dragon". I started doing more sampling and less playing in my songs. Besides being bored with the scene and needing a change I got myself I nice case of tendonitis. Ouch.

   During 1993 I discovered the bands "My Bloody Valentine" and "Lush", the music of these bands moved me more than any guitar-driven song did. I started writing and recording with Kevin Moore of Dream Theater. At this time he wrote "Space Dye Vest", which I played guitar on and programmed drums for. We did several songs while he was still in Dream Theater.

   In April of 1994 I received a phone call to teach at the American Institute of music in Vienna, Austria. The phone call came under the recommendation of Philippe Ansari. He had recommended the last teacher, Todd Duane, who was leaving for various reasons. I almost declined because of my change in taste. I wasn't playing that much guitar anymore and here I was going to replace Todd. Well, I took the gig and had the time of my life. Kevin was preparing to quit Dream Theater and wanted to work together after "Awake" was finished. Dream Theater decided to make "Space Dye Vest" into a Dream Theater song which is how I ended up in the studio credits on "Awake". In September of 1994, Kevin quit the band and asked me to head out to Santa Fe with him. I left my job in Vienna to move to Santa Fe.

   In Santa Fe I wrote and recorded several more songs with Kevin. He was away from his band for the first time 8 years. He really hadn't found a direction for himself yet and the songs were a bit scattered. Among Dream Theater fans, this project has since been called "Music meant to be heard". While in Santa Fe, Mike Varney put me in touch with Kip Winger who was recording a solo album. I ended up playing on a few tunes along with Rod Morgenstein(Dixie Dregs), Alan Pasqua (Alan Holdsworth), Andy Timmons(Danger Danger) and a host of others. I had also been recording via mail with a vocalist in Seattle WA. I was really into the stuff and wanted to pursue it. I decided to leave the project with Kevin and move up to Seattle to work with vocalist, Joel Tippie. Unfortunately, my leaving New Mexico ended my long-term friendship with Kevin. Since this time Kevin has claimed the songs as his own and seemed to have forgotten who did what. Shame...I have alot of respect for the guy. Onward to Seattle....

   This is getting long, too long. I lived in Seattle for awhile writing and recording with Joel. After sometime we decided to head back to NY to continue working on stuff. Here I am now. The project with Joel can be found at mellow26.com. The tunes I did alone, as well as the ones I did with Kip and Kevin can be found on the music page.