Summary

I live in Austin, TX.  My favorite pasttime is playing music.  I play drums with several bands in Austin.  I also enjoy working with computers.  I'm a software jockey by training, but I also use computers to record and make music. 

This page gives a brief background of my life.  If you are looking for my resume, please click here.  If you are interested in my musical experience, please click here.

Background

I was born in Houston, Texas, USA in 1970.  I was preceded 2 years prior by my sister, my only sibling   My father worked for IBM while I was growing up and his job took our family to Atlanta, Georgia for a few years and Mobile, Alabama for a few years before we moved back to Texas.   We moved from Mobile to San Antonio, Texas when I was 9 years old.  I grew up the rest of my childhood there in the house my parents still live in today.  It was the suburbs.  It still is.

My mother and father are both creative people.  My father played guitar and sang songs all the time growing up.  At family get-togethers, he and my uncle would sing and play for the whole family (and still do from time to time).  Eventually they taught me a few things and I joined in before long.  That's how I learned to play music.  My mother is a multi-talented artist.  She taught me so many things, I couldn't possibly do them justice in this synopsis, but I remember she always encouraged me to be creative and to try anything. 

My father and uncle taught me how to program computers when I was about 10 years old.  We bought our first home computer at that time, a Tandy TRS-80.  I was thrilled with it and spent hours upon hours playing around with it.  Each computer we got had more capabilities and I was fast to exploit them and push them to the limits for the next few years.  In sixth grade, I joined the junior highschool band, and learned to play the drums.  I had loved the drums ever since I can remember, confiscating my sister's toy snare when I was 5 and playing it until the head broke.  I played drums all through junior high and high school and in those years really focused my creative energy on music and lost touch with computers a bit.   I was really into my friends in those days, too, and spent most of my free time with them. 

College

After graduating high school, I attened The University Of Texas here in Austin.  I started off as an Electrical Engineering major.  I was so into music and having new freedom away from home, that all I really wanted to do was play in bands and party.  That's pretty much what I did my freshman year, much to the detrement of my grades.  I really wanted to drop out of school and be a rock-and-roll star.  Instead, thanks largely to the influence of my father, I switched into the music school at UT as a percussion major.   I learned a lot of great things about music theory in that year and did well in class. 

I decided after a year that I didn't want to learn all the rules of classical composition or play in a classical ensemble for 4 years, so I switched my major to undecided and took liberal arts classes.   I studied English and Russian, both of which I enjoyed.  I also took Astronomy and Physics, which I loved.  I had an aptitude for math and sciences, which I developed from an early age, and I began thinking that engineering was my calling afterall. 

After being undecided for a year, I switched back into Engineering, Mechanical to be specific.  I took advanced calculus and physics which I really enjoyed, but I wasn't into mechanical engineering as I thought I might be.  After a semester of that, I finally switched to Computer Science which was a natural fit, of course!  Don't ask me why I didn't just major in CS to begin with unless you have time for a long story.  Anyway, I made A's in all my computer science classes, got a BS degree, and landed a job in Richardson, TX with Nortel Networks.  That was in 1994. 

Software

I had a career in software development for 8 continuous years after graduating from college.  Check out my software resume for the gory details.  I made enough money to take several years off and pursue some other interests namely travel, but eventually music, always a passion.  That was in 2002.  I took about a 6 year break from software, but have since gotten back into it.  Not much has changed, but there are some interesting new developments.  Check out my Software Page for more about my current efforts.

Music

Since moving back to Austin in 2003, I've mainly been playing music as an occupation.  I have yet to make enough money to continuously support myself, but I've had the chance to play with some great musicians, go on the road, record on a few albums, and in general pursue a lifelong desire.  It's been great.  Check out my Music Page for more about this!

Present

Currently, I live on an old farm southeast of Austin near Bergstrom airport and McKinney Falls State Park.  Although it's a bit further from the city than I'm used to, it's a very unique setting that I'm learning to really appreciate.  I have a fully operational recording studio here and I have an office where I work on software projects. 

I'm currently seeking a software gig on a team of bright and open-minded people.  I still play drums regularly (see Music) and I'm currently working on two recording projects here in my studio: Dickie Lee Erwin and Jenifer Jackson.