One Christmas, back awhile, I met a gentleman who owned and operated a stained glass business on Cape Cod. You’ve all heard of it, a beautiful stretch of beaches starting at the Cape Cod Canal and ending as a sandbar at P’town. I had been looking for something creative to do, other than music, and he had more work than one person could do, so it seemed to be a win-win. With the prospect of a thousand establishments to perform my music in the evenings, and a day job in a quaint New England village, I was hooked. By the end of our holiday dinner we had agreed that I would come onboard as his apprentice. Turns out it was a great idea! I learned a vocation that I pursued for decades and that also led me to other experiences with hot glass (glass blowing) and sandblasting on the pieces I created. After working for him on the cape I traveled out to Berkeley CA and worked within the glass biz for a large company there for a year or so before returning to New England after learning my father was terminally ill. 

During my time working with glass, I noticed something interesting. Whoever owned the business always had fewer burns and bandages on their hands than we who worked in the shop side did. Hmmm…They also wore clean clothing and went to opulent homes to discuss and design the custom entryways, cabinet panels, fireplace screens and other flat glass works of art. Some may have even had high tea, with a pinky out. I wanted to get me some of that! Besides, burns and bandaids (plasters in New Zealand) don’t really go with guitar playing anyway.

 I decided to study illustration and design at the New England School of Art & Design, now the humanities dept. of Suffolk University. At the time the president of the school, Christy Ruffo, owned a glass company specializing in large scale projects in churches and he helped me to tailor a curriculum to fit my interests. While attending NESAD I got lucky and scored a glass gig with Lynn Hovey in Cambridge MA, a short walk from Harvard University. Harvard coulda’ had me but they snoozed. Lynn was a masterful designer who worked with acid etching and kiln fired painted glass, very old world skill sets there kids. After graduating I, like so many people ping ponging around with the ADHD variant, took a deeper dive into music and started recording my own songs. Explore this website to learn more!

When people ask me if I still do glass work now, I ask them in turn…”Dude! do you see any burns or plasters on me?”

Scratchboard drawing somehow became my medium of choice. Turns out It’s fast, it’s relatively clean, it’s way cheaper than paint and ultimately less collectable. Tony Bennett and Joni Mitchell might have been on to something with the paintings though. Here are some drawings that I scratched out. Nobody told me to stop, so I did not. Thanks for taking a look at my work.