1967 to 1977 - Alaska

I was born in the Inuit village of Noorvik Alaska on March 28th 1967. My parents moved to Anchorage a few months later where we lived for 10 years (with a one year stint in Montreal). By the age of 5 yrs old I was already obsessed with music... Jackson 5, Laura Nyro and whatever else my parents were playing around the house. When I was about 8 yrs old I started buying K-tel hits albums. It was the golden era of pop music where you could hear funk, prog rock and folk within the same 1/2 hour playlist on the radio. Then one day my babysitter put on Kiss Alive and that kick started my love of heavy music. Soon after I bought Toys in the Attic and started wrapping scarfs around a broom stick pretending to be Steven Tyler.

My first concert was Pete Seeger, who as part of his tour of Alaska came to have dinner at our house and watch some of my Dad's films. By the age of ten I had broad tastes in music and had absorbed a fair amount of my parent's passion for social justice as well.

1977 to 1985 - Ithaca NY

At 10 yrs old we moved to Ithaca, NY. It was the height of the disco craze but also the early years of punk. I had mostly listened to my parent's records like Sly, JB, Cannonball Adderly and Ike and Tina and top 40 radio but now I was discovering newer music in the form of Punk, New Wave and Metal. I was hanging out at my friend Rob's house and listening to the records his older brother brought home from bands that you could never hear on the radio. The Sex Pistols, The Ramones, Dead Kennedys and the Plasmatics.

I started going to concerts at a pretty young age, Elvis Costello when I was about 11 and then The Cars and The Ramones when I was still in Jr High. One of the best though, was the Pretenders with the original line up. Me and my friends skipped school to wait in line for hours so we could be in the front row.

I started playing guitar at around 12 yrs old but my first band gig was as a singer because no one else wanted to do it lol. I was mostly self taught and spent countless hours putting needles back on turntables so I could learn a complicated guitar part note for note. My fav guitarists were Randy Rhoads, Alex Lifeson and Steve Stevens. All heavy guitarists who incorporated other styles into their playing and wrote parts that supported the songs.

Spotify Playlist

1985 to 1990 - Hampshire College / Northampton MA

When I arrived at Hampshire College in the Fall of 1985 I was a terrified kid who had never been away from home before. At the end of the first week I met one of the best friends I've ever had, Melissa Rich, and the two of us became inseparable for the rest of the year. We were both super fans of U2 at the time but she introduced me to some of the goth stuff she was into like The Cure and The Cult and also her eventual husband's band Miracle Legion. I heard a lot of new music, some of it new and some of it old stuff I hadn't ever been turned on to. Minor Threat, Billy Bragg, P-Funk and Public Enemy.

I was in a few bands mostly as lead guitarist but sometimes as lead vocalist as well. Everything from the witty country punk of Beatrice to the roots reggae of Uproot to the funkier sounds of Jambone and Pubic Knowledge. I got the chance to play some gigs in NYC , Boston and D.C. and through the Vermont connections of Uproot opened for Phish and jammed with keyboardest Page McConnell onstage when we played in Burlington.

1990 to 1998 - San Francisco

When I moved to S.F. the West Coast grunge scene was in full swing and the lofi world of labels like Kill Rock stars ruled the world of the indie scene. I discovered pop geniuses like Blur, Supergrass and the Cardigans.

I had been into Brazilian music a bit but when I started going to a Brazilian dance class I became immersed in the rich afro-brazilian culture my teacher Conceição brought to class every week. Timbalada, Olodum, Carlinhos Brown (and my teacher's friend Margareth Menezes). I started dancing for Conceição's dance troupe Ginga Brasil and then was asked by Capoeria Mestre Itabora Ferreira to play guitar in his band Som Tribal. The singer, Amanda Santiago, was a young Brazilian exchange student from class who later went on to major fame as a member of Timbalada.

While in S.F. I also became a regular at the infamous queer/punk/drag performance space Klubsitute (also home to Matmos Drew and Martin). I had a pretty hard time connecting musically out there for a while but one night at Klubstitute I met a guy by the name of Paul Bonomo who had just to moved to S.F. and was looking to remake his queer punk band Fagbash with a new lineup. I played a bunch of shows in S.F. and up to Olympia and Seattle but parted ways with the band rather unceremoniously after about a year or so. Around that time my brother,drummer extraordinaire, Darren Kennedy moved out to S.F. and we started a heavy melodic band called Bless and Burn with bassist Dave Saul. We played the S.F. rock club circuit for a while and wound up playing a set at Burning Man shortly before breaking up.

1998 to 2016 - Ithaca NY

When I returned to my hometown of Ithaca I listened every week to Bernie Milton's radio show and re-experienced the music my parents listened to discovering old gems like the Honeycone. This was also when I started to write like crazy and made the shift from Guitarist to Singer/Songwriter and eventually Producer.

I recorded a CD produced by local drummer/producer Matt Saccuccimorano in 2005 and released it on local record label I-Town records. After that, I mostly produced other artist's music and played in a few other bands including Papa Muse (gtr, producer) and the Sutras (gtr). Right now I'm working on finishing up my second solo record and looking forward to recording some of my more recent material.