Bio

"How did you get where you are today?" I hear this question asked of me often enough, because I'm a teacher of people who are on their way somewhere who hope there is a well worn path with easily identifiable landmarks to follow. "It's mostly luck- I was just minding my own business..." is my usual response. If you want to get there the same way, I think the route is already used up to get here, and you're going over there. I might be able to help you discover for yourself what I mean by "minding my own business:" focus on the task at hand. The corollary is to do what you love- everything else follows. Right now, for me, this is how I look at my trip.

I remember beating the bottoms out of waste baskets with wooden spoons and several toy drums I also destroyed before the age of three. There were people coming and going through our house all the time to take music lessons. Dad was a high school band director at the time, so I heard instruments of every variety, and my mother taught piano. I must not have been particularly impressed with the brass and woodwinds, but I loved the sound of the piano. But oooh- those guys with the snare drums- so much more sound, so much more motion! So on my third birthday I got my own snare drum. First thing I practiced was folding my arms with the sticks in one hand. Or maybe shoving the sticks in my back pocket and walkin' around bein' cool.

We moved to Missouri in 1960 when dad got a job at a college. Although there were still piano students everyday, the noisier lessons were happening up at the college. There were lots of cool instruments there. I could reach the timpani if I could climb this really high stool, but I fell off that same stool when I tried to play the xylophone cuz the notes were still too far away. That one would have to wait until I got big. The kids that came to the house were a lot bigger than the ones I remembered from before. Lots of times they just came there to hang out. Some of them would come around in the evenings and listen to dad's jazz records. Mom and dad would teach them how to play the stuff on the records and they'd jam way after we three kids were supposed to be in bed. If nothing else, I learned how to be quiet and pay attention while listening to music- nothing worse than getting caught and sent back to bed. Although I think mom and dad knew I was sneakin' around. I also learned how much fun people had playing music.

I first started giving drum lessons when I was in Jr. High. Even though I learned at a very early age, I had the benefit of seeing my parents teach kids how to do things that may not have come as easily for them. So, I guess I don't know who the "natural players" are, unless they're the ones who start earlier. But I do know some who began learning after that mysterious "window of opportunity" should have been closed, but excelled anyway. So I also discovered that teaching is an inexact science and cut and dried formulas don't work for every student.

My college years were spent at the Eastman School of Music. It was there that I learned how hard I had to work to achieve anything worth having. But I also wasted a great deal of time: I missed a huge opportunity to learn about a lot of subjects I am intensely interested in now such as composing, arranging, scoring for film... So if I ever say "no regrets," it's except for that. (Well, maybe a few too many wasted brain cells in the process...) Wasting time like that has far reaching ramifications, but I couldn't have gotten here without going there first. And besides, in the meantime, I took lessons with Leigh Howard Stevens and performed often with Gordon Stout. They may not have been living legends at the time, but everybody knew they would be. Leigh ignited a real spark of imagination in me that gave me something positive to do the rest of the time I was in college. And Gordon is, well... Gordon.

I got sidetracked during most of the 80s paying a lot of attention to shrubs and trees, flowers, insects, habitats, weather, and wet feet. I worked at a garden center/landscape operation in Hingham, Massachusetts. In addition to learning to appreciate the world around me, I also learned how to go to work everyday, pay the bills, and to pour every ounce of effort into taking care of business. I learned how to persevere in tedium. I learned how to value other people, and converse with people I had no previous experience with: truckers, laborers, customers, businessmen... We did landscaping for the wealthy, both old money and new. I learned to like them too. As this day job occupied more and more of my energy, I let the music business go out of my daily existence almost altogether. It wasn't the job that caused the hole, but it was the job that filled the hole. No looking back except to say, what I would have done is what I did. But if I had known then what I know now... Since music started for me at an early age, I just got busy again. I never forgot how to ride a bike either.

Gordon Stout extended the opportunity for me to break out of what seemed to be a dead end. Gordon was there for me. I had a place to practice a more constructive and responsible plan, and he gave me more support than he'll ever know. Thanks, man.

So now I'm here in Ohio, mindin' my own business.

From time to time, I have a spark of imagination. It's rarely sustainable, so I have to pursue it with singular intensity. I lose focus quickly, so I concentrate on one project at a time. I also get caught up in details easily, so if I have a lot of minor projects along with major ones, I ditch all the minor projects, or I'll never get around to the big ones. I have literally pounds of paperwork that will never get done.

I have no idea what constitutes "good music." I try to give everything a fair listening, but some music I have to take in small doses. There are many purposes for music and they vary between cultures. Blatant commercialism, political propaganda, escapism, sound cover for public restrooms, and boom boxes outdoors may be less than noble and terrifically annoying, but they still count as viable art forms that somebody put a lot of work into producing. Doesn't mean I have to like it, but I'm not going to write it off either. I've found I don't appreciate being assaulted by music, so if I want to hear something composed with that intention, I prefer to hear it where I can adjust the volume.

That's enough for now. I've got things to do. See ya.

Tyler-Rounds Jazz Duo Tyler Rounds Island Sounds