About me

Born 1974 in New Zealand, I was brought up in a home with lots of music - mum was a classically trained pianist and music teacher.

My musical career started with about a year and a half of classical piano lessons at primary school. I then progressed to do a year and a half of trumpet lessons, but at that stage I was more interested in playing with friends. So I ended up just having fun on mum’s piano at home, jamming and composing.

When I was about 10 years old I became interested in playing the drums - which my parents graciously allowed me to do. I was self taught and was able to play a little bit at church and other youth related events.

At age 12 I became good friends with two guys - one who was a guitarist/bassist and the other a drummer. After realising the drummer friend was a much better drummer than I, I decided to concentrate on playing keyboards.

My teen years were filled with playing rock music predominantly with some country, jazz and blues thrown in for good measure.
I was able to play virtually every weekend at either church or youth group or with the band that I was in - sometimes I did all 3 in a week.
I lived, breathed and ate music!

At 19 I married my sweetheart Vanessa and audtioned for the Conservatorium of Music in Wellington, New Zealand. I was accepted and we shifted to Wellington that following year.
This was the start of my formal Jazz education majoring on piano.

It was a very musical time. In Wellington, not only was I studying and playing Jazz I was also given many opportunities to play other styles of music with some of NZ’s finest musicians.

I was involved in an R’nB/Funk band as well as other projects including studio session recording, supporting original recording artists, TV shows and programming.

Through this time I had also been teaching to some degree -mostly private students but some school and class teaching as well.

2000 rolled around and I was offered a music director/keyboardist role with an Australian singer, Leigh Haywood, which meant shifting to Sydney with my wife Ness and our baby son Cyrus.

Since being in Australia, I have had many more fantastic musical experiences from tours, shows, gigs, session work, screen composition, working at Turramurra Music Store as well as teaching.

I was music director one day a week for a church on the upper north shore of Sydney - leading bands, developing and running training,etc. - for 4 years (finished September 2006)

Currently, I spend most of my time teaching privately, playing in a couple of cover’s bands, composing music for TV/screen, working at Turramurra music one day a week, songwriting and leading church music teams.

I also continue to study - either self directed or with teachers (Guitar; classical piano; orchestration; etc). I believe that learning is a life long pursuit.

Remember to practise hard and have fun!!