Music
Music has always been important to me.  I took classical piano lessons for about 8 years
as a kid, and taught myself a little guitar when I was a teenager.  It has only been in recent
years, though, that I've come along and gotten better.

I now have a Technics Electronic Ensemble, which is a full keyboard instrument that does
a very good imitation of a grand piano, plus numerous other voicings.  It has a variety of
drum options, and an ok keyboard simulation of a bass.  So I like to do songs and load
in a piano part and a drum part, and then play a bass line onto it.  I can be a sort of one man
band.  I don't know beans about playing bass, but it all comes out in a form I find entertaining.

Below is the cat being entertained by some of my song stylings.

I don't play from music much any more.  I'm no ear player, but if I can get a chord charting
and I know the song I can usually work it into something.

Music to me is mainly an emotional experience, and I can express emotionality in what I play.
I also write songs, and like to search for good melodic/lyrical combinations, and try to do songs
that say something.

I can't sing worth anything, which has always been a regret.  But I've developed a melodic piano
style so I kinda let my right hand do the singing.

I also have a Guild D-30 guitar, on which I generally have a portable pickup.  I can play chords
and a few leads, but mostly I use it for writing songs.  Sometimes I just sit and do old rock leads.

The songs I write are about relationships.  As such, some are happy, some are sad, some are
tinged with bitterness and regret.  These almost always concern personal experiences,  and thus
are important to me that way.

No illusions here that anything I do is very good.  I'm a Wannabe.  But I play everyday,  I feel
good when I play,  my songs remind me of the times of my life,  and that is my goal.
 

Other People's Music
I have very broad musical tastes.  I find myself most often playing the piano versions of works
by Carole King (who I adore), Carly Simon, and Billy Joel.

But the next minute I might be doing old doo-wop stuff, and I can make a lotta noise pounding
out Runaround Sue, Sh-Boom, and other old  E-C#m- A - B  stuff.

When I listen to recorded music it is generally 60s rock.   My all time favorite band is the
Zombies.  I love their bluesy, often minor key stuff.   The Hollies were a great vocal band.
The Kinks write about the people and places they know, and do it so well.  The Standells
are just fun.  I was early on a fan of the Electric Prunes, and still enjoy Too Much to Dream.
The Nazz, with Tod Rundgren, had a terrific style.

I have a large jazz collection.  Pianists like Bill Evans and Oscar Peterson.  Horn players
like Dizzy and Miles and Chet Baker, and saxophonists like Gerry Mulligan, Lester Young, Paul Desmond, and Stan Getz.  Love the tone and style of guitarist Wes Montgomery. For vocals
Diana Krall is hard to beat.

Bela Fleck and the Flecktones are awesome and I have most of their stuff.  Unbelievable
musicality to what they do.