I was born on November 20, 1971, at Sutter Memorial     Hospital in Sacramento, California.  Or so they tell me.  I don't actually remember it.

We always had a piano in the house, and I

really wanted to know how to play it.  This is

one of my earliest forays.

                     I went to grade school in Sacramento, where I

                     played cello in the school orchestra.  Around

                     this time I also took guitar lessons.  Armed       

                     with treble clef, bass clef, and the circle of

                     fifths, I continued to explore the

piano on my own.  In sixth grade I wrote my first

piece of music.  By the time I got to high school,

I was playing elementary pieces by Mozart,

Brahms, and Khachaturian, and I could also play

by ear, improvise, and transpose.

                                     I attended Sacramento High School, 

                                     home of VAPAC, the district's arts

                                     magnet program.  I got high grades

                                     in everything except Economics and

                                     Chemistry, and I was in a bunch of clubs, like California Scholarship Federation, Academic Decathalon, Creative Writing, and even the competitive math team, Mathletes!

My sophomore year I did my first show, a Kabuki version of "Beauty and the Beast."  Sorry, no photos available!  From then on, I was very involved in the school's theater program.