I was born in Seattle and grew up in Bothell, Washington in what used to be a small burg north of Seattle. I was the youngest of 5 children and consequently hopelessly spoiled!
My musical training began with piano lessons at 6. My mom tells me I was singing the alto part to hymns before I could read the words. However, someone noticed my beautiful yet piercing voice and made a comment to my mom about it while I was present. Thus ended my singing career until college.
Growing up I could listen to any note or chord and instantly play it on the piano. I don’t remember ever not being able to do that. Such is the nature of perfect pitch – you can’t work at it, no matter what that cheesy guy in the trade mag adverts tells you. You come that way from the factory, although my friend Patrick Fata thinks all babies are born with it, but it’s lost early on. He may be right. I’ll be writing an article [on this site] about perfect pitch becoming not-so-perfect, a phenomenon that has kicked me squarely in unpleasant musical places over the last few years.
The next few paragraphs are about my college years and immediately thereafter. You might want to skip down (to the end?) unless you’re my mom or a long-lost friend. Seriously, we don’t usually track how long you stay on this page ...
I Graduated from Cedarville University in 1974, with a degree in music performance and theory, traveling the country singing and playing with a band I formed called Selah, one of several bands by that name over the
last few decades. The band broke up in 1978, 3 months after I married Mary Wood. It may or may not have been a sort of a Yoko thing.
Opportunities arose to play keyboards and produce at Pinebrook studios in Alexandria, Indiana, and though it was clearly not worth the drive for the money I made, I was intrigued by the recording studio and continued to
drive back and forth. By 1981 I was getting more chances to work at what is now called Gaither Studios. Mary and I, with 9 month old Emily in tow, moved to Indiana to a location between Pinebrook (now Gaither Studios), and Mary’s childhood home in Kokomo, and Indianapolis, where I was getting occasional work with ASA productions as a player and occasional jingle writer. Truthfully, to say I was a jingle writer is a bit euphemistic – I wasn't very good at it!
I had not considered a career in music production, arranging, playing, and songwriting, until these opportunities presented themselves in the late 70’s and early 80’s. I recall upon meeting Mary’s parents, her mom asked her (not within earshot) if I was planning to get a real job. Sadly, I never did. I suppose part of the concern was my disheveled and eccentric appearance; I was in the habit of not tying my shoes, my coat was some old man’s cast-off I had found, and my clothes were not shall we say well-coordinated. I had longer hair and a beard, which at that time to conservative, God-fearing Baptist parents was not a good omen, to put it gently.
I continued to get more gigs at Pinebrook, producing and arranging albums for a variety of mom and pop groups, various quartets and trios, and solo artists. I was not the quickest learner at the art of producing, but I had the advantages of perfect pitch and could tickle the ivories quite well.
In 1982 or 1983 I was producing a record for a Christian band, whose name escapes me, and a young aspiring songwriter and artist named Ray Boltz came to the session to watch it go down. He was impressed enough to ask me to produce his first recording. He was a local artist with a bent for storytelling, and sang at
various functions, including prisons and retirement homes. His first album included a 6- or 7-minute song entitled “Watch the Lamb”. Neither of us knew anything about the Christian recording industry, or how to make a hit record. We simply tried to make his songs interesting and to our liking.
His sophomore effort, Thank You, was distributed by Diadem Records out of Nashville. The title track was a #1 song on both the AC and Inspirational charts, staying on top for quite a few weeks, and becoming the Gospel Music Association's Song of the Year. “Shepherd Boy” was the next single from that album; it likewise went to #1 on both Inspirational and AC charts. Bill Gaither owned half the publishing to some of Ray’s songs, and published an ill-fated musical entitled “Thank You.”
As a studio keyboardist, my background as a classical pianist was helpful in developing an accurate technical approach to playing sessions.
I’ve taken some rabbit trails in this riveting extended music history of my life, and even my mom would probably have given up by now, but I plod on, determined to finish this breathtaking bio!
My home studio, ZooWest, came into being circa 1990. The recording medium known as ADATs had been developed, and eventually, I decided it might be doable to record at least a few of the demos or overdubs I was doing at my own facility. I slowly added to the gear that I owned, and within a few short years had a fairly functional ADAT based studio. Might I add that while ADATs became somewhat standard in most studios, it was a very imperfect and not-so-pleasant technology.
In the late 90’s I took the leap into the world of Pro Tools. I’d like to apologize to all my engineering friends who patiently answered my plethora of questions for a few years as I struggled to come to terms with this new way of recording. Though I didn’t quite get the way that it interfaced with our analog world, I was entranced
and thrilled with this new, non-linear approach to recording and especially editing. No matter that I didn’t have the logical thinking processes of some of my brilliant keyboard compatriots – I was able to make it do essentially what I wanted it to do.
When we decided to add the music studio to our home, I was thinking of it simply as a room to house the piano and where I would do some arranging. Fortunately, we decided at the 11th hour to include a small bathroom, and the space was large enough that many years later, we separated it into two rooms, one for the
singers and instrumentalists, and the other for the control room.
I have been fortunate to work with Hal Leonard Publications out of Milwaukee in many different ways over the years. First as a studio player in the earliest years of my acquaintance with them, and later as an arranger and producer. As a player, there have been a couple ongoing projects I’ve worked on with them – their Essential Elements recordings for school kids of all ages, and musicals for young children.
There was a monstrously large project some years back for Hal Leonard - a collaboration with MacMillan McGraw Hill on new music textbooks for many of our nation’s school children. They employed me, as well as others, to produce the music that would be used in the classrooms to educate children and help teachers with that task. I believe I was responsible for about 125 of the songs, and my family will attest to the fact that I should either have attempted less, or hired some additional help; I was in way over my head for 6 months or
so.
Mary and I have traveled to Ukraine often over the years for various reasons, having adopted Luke from Kiev in1993, Our daughter Liz, her husband, and their 4 children live a couple hours west of Kiev.
I'm the music guy at our church in Tipton, Indiana. My favorite aspect of this responsibility is that I get to choose the songs. There is a plethora of bad to very average (or congregationally unfriendly) contemporary songs IMNSHO that I try very hard to avoid!
I'm currently in the midst of song selection and song refinement for a new project for Mike Delph from Carmel, Indiana; preparing to continue work on a Grief Recovery project with Paul and Leslie Turner from New Albany, IN, and just now finishing up an Easter cantata written by John Carter from Dunkirk, IN. (not the guy who went to Mars!)