I don’t remember this, but my Mom always talked about how when I was 3 or 4 years old, she heard me playing the Doxology from church by ear on an old piano out on our porch. I don’t know if that’s a proud Mom beefing up the real story or if it actually happened that way. Either way, it sounds cool, so we’ll go with it.
It wasn’t until I was about 8 years old that I started taking piano lessons. I got the greatest first teacher any kid could possibly want- Grandma. She played organ at church literally forever. Still does, actually. I would get off the bus at her house on Wednesdays and go around looking for snacks to avoid having to learn how to actually read music.
From that point on, I learned piano pretty much like any other kid does. Avoiding Bach assignments like they were the plague. I learned well enough and quick enough for a bunch of adults to tell me how great I was. That was pretty cool and I’m glad I had the self-awareness at that age to stop any of it from going to my head.
Just kidding. Literally all of it went to my head.
Luckily, I began to learn my lesson in humility when I discovered what would ultimately be the most important factor in my musical trajectory-
Oscar Peterson.
Instead of quitting the piano altogether after hearing Oscar (that was plan A), I decided that this new sound I had never heard before was exactly what I wanted to play. Jazz blasted into my life like Elon blasted a car into f-ing orbit. I was completely blown away and excited by the sounds and the rhythms and the harmony.
That led me to Lee.
Knowing that I was getting into this new thing called Jazz, my Grandmother (she’s just the greatest, isn’t she?) spotted a local PBS telethon auction. Some Albany, NY area Jazz pianist was auctioning off two lessons… Her name was Lee Shaw.
Grandma put in the bid, but got beat in the final seconds of the auction. Not to be deterred, she got right on the phone and called Lee, explaining that her grandson (me) was getting into this music and asking if Lee would be willing to see him (also me) for two lessons.
That was my Christmas present that year, and it wound up being the start of a 5 year relationship studying with Lee before I left for college. I owe every part of who I am musically to her. She taught me about improvisation, harmony and most importantly, that music is a language.
Everything after that only further solidified and expanded on the knowledge Lee set the basis for. I attended the Conservatory of Music at Purchase College in Westchester County, NY. There, I had the great fortune to study with great pianists like Hal Galper, Kevin Hays, Andy Laverne, David Hazeltine, Charles Blenzig and Pete Malinverni.
I’ve had the opportunity to take the stage with artists such as Jon Faddis, Gary Smulyan, Joe Magnarelli and Ignacio Berroa at venues like The Blue Note NYC, Dizzy’s Club at Lincoln Center, Birdland Jazz Club, The Falcon and Saratoga Performing Arts Center.
Most recently, I’ve moved to Denver, CO to pursue some other passions of mine in tandem with music. Those include running my company, Cornell Digital, living life as close to being a ski bum as I possibly can, and enjoying the outdoors among some of the greatest scenery this country has to offer.
Then Came YouTube
In the spring of 2019, my life changed forever.
That’s a pretty typical thing for people to say, I fully acknowledge that, but I mean…it really did.
I had this stupid idea to make a few videos surrounding a concept which I had seen years ago in college where a musician will play along to the rhythmic cadence and even sometimes the pitch of spoken word. It’s a hilarious concept that dates back into the 60s as far we currently know, but has likely been around much longer than that. It makes funny videos way funnier and is wildly entertaining to watch.
I thought it would be a fun project to try my hand at, so I made one. Of Cardi B. And the rest is history.
I woke up the next morning to an Instagram DM informing me that the video had been posted on Twitter and Cardi B herself had retweeted it. What followed was a day which I can only describe as being out of a crazy dream. By the time it was said and done, that video had somewhere around 20 million views across multiple social media platforms, and I wound up with 5 different social media accounts with well over 6-figure audiences.
Since then, I have (somehow) successfully converted that kickstart into a YouTube channel all about music and showing people cool things that they can learn and try for themselves.
My Band
“Grew up learning this music together” is an understatement. After meeting in high school, I began playing with my drummer, Matt Niedbalski and bass/saxophone player, Steven Kirsty. Together we’ve developed a relationship that is now 10 years in the making. These guys are my brothers in music. As you might expect, when you play together with a group of guys for that long, you start to get to know what each other is going to do. There’s almost a sense of telepathy going on on the bandstand.
We’re all connected by a common taste and appreciation of Jazz and its historic roots. But even so, we each have our own style and preferences that we bring to the table. Aside from being two of my best friends in the world, they’re some of the most talented players I’ve ever known.
Somewhat unfortunately, I now live in Denver, CO and we don’t get many chances to play these days. As much as I love living in the Rockies, here’s hoping we’ll figure out how to spend more time doing what we love to do together. Yelling at Steve.
..and playing music or whatever
Matt and I met in high school at a local jazz club in Glens Falls, NY called Wallabee’s. Ironically, we were both brought there by our respective high school music teachers who probably had no business bringing their students to a jazz bar, but who luckily knew what was truly important in a developing musician’s experiences: getting out and hearing the damn music live. We hit it off both as musicians and friends and have subsequently grown up learning this music together, both of us influencing each other’s styles and preferences along the way.
Steven and I met over 10 years ago at the Skidmore Summer Jazz Institute in Saratoga Springs. It was one of the first days at the program and we were all getting on a bus. I didn’t know anybody yet, but as I walked up the aisle looking for a seat, Steve offered the seat next to his. The first thing he said when I sat down was, “dude, check this out,” as he put his headphones over my ears. We’ve been friends ever since. He always played saxophone in the group until we figured out he was a better bass player than even most bass players around.