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My Mom was a flutist, and my dad was a pianist, one of my brothers a bassoonist and the other a violinist. I quickly became influenced by my first oldest brother, Joel who played violin -
Like both of my brothers, I joined Sistema. An afterschool program where children learn how to play orchestral instruments, and play together in the orchestral setting. Seeing others as well as my brother thrive and learn skills on instruments inspired me. -
My dad had always owned a guitar. I found it to be fascinating that a string instrument could be used in such a wide variety of musical contexts as compared to the just the orchestra. I learned a few things. I was also inspired by my oldest brother Isaac who was already a proficient guitar player as well as bassoonists. -
Isaac played alto saxophone with his school band. He sometimes played it at home to which I was fascinated. He taught me the basics and how to play a few tunes
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After advancing through the levels of Sistema’s orchestras, I joined the Moncton Youth Orchestra. It had the nature of simply being a trade for my mom buying me a saxophone with little interest that I had left for violin playing.
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After one year of the Moncton Youth Orchestra, a combination of Joel’s hatred of violin spilling over to me and interests in other things, I quit violin entirely.
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Between 2019 and 2021, I had a two year break without playing any instruments. I had time to pickup other hobbies like playing video games and explore other forms of activity. -
As any guitarist would, I became drawn to the music of Eddie and the rest of Van Halen. I would go on to learn songs such as Panama and Eruption on guitar -
In my grade 8 music class, many people were playing guitar. This sparked the interest that I had for guitar once again. I started learning guitar while I was in class and eventually got a teacher for private lessons weekly.
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After a while, my grandmother grew tired of me always playing on her kit at her house, so she decided to give it to me. I could now play whenever I wanted to at my own home. I learned from YouTube and other online sources and it became one of my most popular hobby.
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I had one lesson with Matt, and it was very clear that I did not want to become a trumpet player. I found it hard to read the music of a transposing instrument, and decided to give up on trumpet. Unfortunate for my mom who had dreamt of me rejoining MYO as a trumpeter, was never to be.
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After being a technically proficient guitar player who had no interest in musicianship, traditional methods of teaching or taking anything slowly, my teacher got upset with me during two of my lessons. I decided that I no longer had interest in seeking guidance from him and stopped taking guitar lessons entirely. I still continued to play without guidance whenever I had free time.
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One day, I was mowing my grandmother’s lawn. While mowing the backyard, I catch a glimpse of a drum kit sitting in the recreational room in the basement. Curious, I went inside after mowing and decided to try it out. Sparking my interest, I mowed again and subsequently played the kit again. This was the beginning of my percussion journey.
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My mom knew I was interested in the drum kit, but not the rest of the percussion world. She encouraged me to learn trumpet from Matt Ross, a Sistema colleague of hers who she respected much. So I acquired a trumpet and also a saxophone once again in the hopes of finding a niche that would get me into an ensemble. I began learning these instruments on the side of the kit.
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When playing drums, the style of jazz is always talked about. I decided to listen to Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Buddy Rich, and Cannonball Adderly. These sounds made me more interested in that style of drumming from an early time -
My mom convinced me to try and join the MYO as a percussionist. I took my first lesson with Joel who is a well known teacher of percussion in the Greater Moncton area as well as other places. It was a kick in the ass for someone who had been self-taught with percussion up until that point as well as not studying any standard repertoire for orchestral instruments. I was skeptical of him as I did not have a huge amount of respect for percussionists in the orchestra at the time. -
After a disappointing rehearsal from uninteresting repertoire, bad equipment and disorganization, I left the HTHS Concert Band in my sophomore year.
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Rush was one of the coolest bands to me when I started drumming. Drummer Neil Peart was the powerhouse of Rush’s groove, and I found myself covering songs such as Subdivisions and YYZ. Songs I still hold close to this day -
In my freshman year, I joined the Harrison Trimble High School Concert Band as drum set player. With conductor Matthew Bouchard, we performed many medleys of famous music from many places familiar.
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Mr. Gillis was a music teacher who inspired me to join the Music for Humans club. This club was a group of musicians who were interested in performing music in rock band style settings in various school settings. I joined and performed as guitarist at many coffee houses.
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The Police also became a common Spotify listen for me. Drummer Stewart Copeland playing with inspirations from reggae and his upbringing in Egypt influenced me to also be creative and mash together different genres. -
After keeping my drum set identity in high school for the most part limited, in my junior year, I came back as drum set player for many different band scenarios
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I rejoined the MYO and quickly learned my way around the orchestral instruments with the help of Joel at the same time. It was so strange to be part of an orchestra by my own choice and interest.
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After being in MYO for a year, I decided it was time to take the next step in percussion. I auditioned for the New Brunswick Youth Orchestra. Once I was there, I was exposed to a whole new ecosystem of percussionist students and teachers. Where I thought I was (the top of the barrel), it turns out I was just a wee lad to the other percussionists. -
In my junior year of high school, a new music teacher came named Ms. Burns. She changed the music culture. Before, it was dull and not given enough attention. Burns replenished the hearts and minds of the students and staff at HTHS with music and brought a new wave of musical pride. I rejoined the Concert Band as the principal percussion player and performed frequently at school events.
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When starting out on marimba. I constantly watched marimba artists such as Katarzyna Mycka, Mark Ford and Kevin Bobo. I was inspired, and even went on to perform works that they had played. -
Dvorak’s New World Symphony was the first full symphony I had ever performed. Watching Owen Melanson, a colleague of mine perform timpani in this piece made me inspired in a semi jealous but driven from the right place kind of way. This piece was the first taste I had of proper classical music, and it tasted good. -
The NBYO percussion coach Ian Gibson changed how I looked at playing percussion and playing with the orchestra. He believes that the best orchestral players always have a reason to play what they are playing in a certain way, which is influenced by different factors. Primarily, what is happening around in the orchestration and written in the score. Making it your job to discover different sounds and possibilities and combining that with the knowledge of the score was always what he preached. -
Last year in NBYO, we performed the biggest orchestral work I have performed to date. Mahler Symphony No. 1. A grand work that is typically only played by professional orchestras, and for the first time was played in New Brunswick, by a youth orchestra. We made history that year. The piece is filled with different inspirations from Mahler’s life such as nature, dance, death, and hero versus villain activity. These aspects satisfied my appetite for works alike. -
I auditioned for the Glenn Gould School of Music this year. Unfortunately due to lack of inside knowledge about my competition being post masters degree percussionists, I had little chance of getting in. While at the audition, Charles Settle the principal percussionist of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the teacher of percussion at GGS listened to my audition and gave me insightful tips about percussion playing that I hadn’t thought of before. Not making GGS didn’t discourage me, it drove me. -
When being adjudicated for the National Music Festival, I met Dr. Graeme Francis from the University of Texas at San Antonio. He gave me insight into diving deeper and listening deeper into my playing to develop my playing accordingly.