A Path To Drummming

Serving music and artists' visions - I was raised in a musical household in Brooklyn New York where I learned to play piano and sing at a very young age. I knew I wanted to play drums by the time I was 10. In the summer of 1972 I began attending Babatunde Olatunji's Center for African Culture in Harlem, NY where I formally practiced Nigerian drum and dance for 2 years. This formal training instilled the abilities and confidence to attend and participate in the rich tradition of Cuban and Puerto Rican rhumbas that would regularly pop-up in the parks and rooftops of New York (these kinds of rhumbas are invaluable mentoring opportunities for an aspiring drummer to gain discipline in clave, guanguanco, bembe rhythms and their myriad variations in a live setting). Later in my teens I would go to see bands and recognized that I understood what the drummers played on trap-set. So, I began to seek out drum-set coaches to learn technique and independence for drum-set. Of those teachers, Allen Nelson, David Garibaldi, Anthony Williams made profound impressions upon my drumming development ( my playing leans towards jazz, funk and rock).

My first professional drum chair was as percussionist with The Pagan Babies in Honolulu HI in 1982. I've never looked back since. More on my professional activities and discography here.