Happy New Year! For the first time in about four months I’m allowing myself to take a break from work to sit on the couch and watch TV with my family. This much needed Holiday break could not have come at a better time, as I have just experienced one of the most brutal, work-intensive, semesters I have had at Berklee so far. Continue reading ""3...2...1...""

Thus ends one of the most brutal sequences of weeks in my Berklee-related history. After seven midterms, while completing my application before the deadline for the Berklee Achievement Scholarship, and my Robbie Krieger interview for Modern Guitars Magazine, sleep seems like some ancient ritual that I have not experienced in quite some time. When midterms end there is a brief day or two of relaxation where you can actually find time to go to a party, watch a movie or hang out with the girlfriend or boyfriend that you have been neglecting- right before you fall right back into the daily grind... Continue reading "Fret Not!"

When there are Red Sox uniforms and caps everywhere on the street, people singing at traffic lights and in the hallways, and when Steve Mouse makes a dramatic re-introduction, you can be sure you’ve returned to the Berklee College of Music for a new year. For me, coming back was as natural as coming back home after going to the store. Before you know it, you are right back in the groove... Continue reading "On The Upbeat: Year Two!"

I dreamt I stayed up until 4:00 a.m. after my whole family had gone to sleep, playing the jazz standard "Fly Me to the Moon", shredded myself silly playing Yngwie Malmsteen’s "Bedroom Eyes", jammed along for fun with a 12-bar blues backing track in Eb, and then finished recording a song for my new band until I fell asleep over my guitar on my keyboard. Continue reading "Practice Makes..."

It’s over. It’s really over…I won’t soon forget looking back at Berklee as I drove across the bridge towards home, remembering all the moments that I have shared over this first year. Nine months ago I was a very different guitar player, and a very different person. Berklee has shaped me into a much more mature, accomplished musician and self-sufficient adult, but, the truth be told, I was ready to go home. Continue reading "No Place Like Home"