Over the years people have always asked me at places I have played in both lives "play something you like" and I usually always have to tell them I can't play that here. I made my money playing pop and knowing it well and that's usually what I have been hired to do. Truth is as a kid collecting records and listening to Casey and American Top 40 I became glued to chart-watching hit-playing pop and AM radio by age 7. Then when I was 12 I got my first "serious" receiver and turntable and decent speakers. It's amazing what the promise of my own stereo did for my grades in school. 🤪 Needless to say my parents regretted that in minutes however that also introduced me to a whole new world of FM album rock stations I could never pick up on my little portable radios and that is where everything changed. 

At that point I was playing keyboards in a band that was mostly a cover band back then. Somewhere along the way in the late 70s our manager decided we would make more money playing country which was really not my thing but we did so I was leading 4 different musical lives. I'm taking piano lessons playing overtures and concerto pieces like Bach and Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, working a flame-throwing AM pop power station by day in the Chicago suburbs, playing urban country in the band and doing part time at a blazing Album rock station when I could fill in. Being a keyboard player and having the hands for it and not being able to play guitar was frustrating. In high school band I was playing 3 valve horns and in the marching band I was playing drums. The music in my head never stopped and sometimes living within my mind was torture having to choose what I liked vs what everyone wanted me to play.

I have been threatening to do this page for years. So I threw my headphones on and. started playing some of my personal favorites and this is barely the tip of the iceberg. Everyone asks me what's my favorite song and the musician in me screams cause that's like the weather, wait 5 minutes, it will change. I listen to everything but usually lean more towards rock depending on mood, time of day, which way the wind is blowing or what I ate this morning. Some of you might be surprised and I dare you to get to the end of this first one. There will be more as I feel the moods for them so consider this one a "sampler" 😋  This one starts in the 1970s and goes all over before it ends. Bookmark the site and watch for more 😁 I will be adding new ones as time allows.

Mixtape 1 7-7-26 - A few of my favorite things.