Listen to the shadowsÂeclectic piano-driven rock that will take you on a journey through perspectives of social, political, and sexual relevance.

13 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Progressive Rock, POP: Piano



Details:
Reality is a shadow. Plato taught that if you live in the shadows, you'll create your own reality...
I grew up in a very strict, southern, religious home as a minister's son. As a child, I escaped the rigid conformity of my environment with frequent respites in the intangible world of music and art, transcending beliefs, cultures, and traditions. What I discovered, long before I could articulate it, was a primal world--a world that didn't segregate along religious and social lines. We see through the eyes of artists, musicians, and poets the blunt concupiscence of our thoughts as well as the undying beauty of the most mundane, every day routines. I began writing at an early age as well as drawing, playing piano, and imagining that I was an inhabitant of this ethereal, cathartic planet where I could just be myself and express my thoughts and dreams not only with ease, but also with the acceptance of the common vernacular. I was told quite often that "boys don't do" this or that by many "men." Despite the stagnant paradigms, my mother cultivated my talents by pushing me in private art lessons, teaching me the piano, and frequent recitations from romantic poetry, and to this day, remains a foundation in my thoughts and work, demonstrating timeless strength and beauty throughout the rash changes her life has seen. An old Cherokee quote comes to mind: "the soul would have no rainbow if the eye had no tears."
A precocious child, I was always conscious of and drawn to the darker side of humanity--that interplay between good/evil, dark/light, etc. I found that love and hate can be very much the same thing and can wear the same hat. We're taught in such a polar fashion: black-white, right-wrong, ugly-beautiful. It didn't work for me, because I love grey, and we're missing the grey in this world. It is the balancing force that I seek to translate heavily into my work--the people you can't label, the tones for which you couldn't procure a description, the feelings on which you can't place a finger. I hope that we, being at a crossroads in human history, with so much information available to us, can benefit from the grey side: the side without a "side." The Sounding Bell is about shadow, and about resonating in the places most impenetrable.
My wife has inspired me to explore more fully the feminine psyche, Venus and her power, and the androgyny that women are more willing to embrace than do men, generally speaking. I'm overwhelmed by the raw sexual energy a woman possesses; and the way a man can embody this archetype, if given the space. Androgyny is the grey area between the sexes that we've so clinically given labels and roles. Sometimes when I play at the piano, I can't tell if it's a masculine or feminine muse that bears the gift of inspiration, but they're really one in the same. I think the music reflects that. I also enjoy studying philosophy, religion, the psyche, cooking vegetarian food with my wife, hiking, dancing, and spending precious time with my loved ones, who bring so much light to my life, helping me to balance not only my own shadows but the shadows of all human existence.