Growing up as a PK (Pastor's kid) & youngest of 4 boys, music has always been in my family. Mum was quite accomplished on piano and organ & Dad had a beautiful tenor voice. They were quite the inspiration. Mum even went onto to teaching piano and organ, & in her 60s & 70s learned pipe organ on the Wollongong Town Hall organ under the tutelage of Robert Ampt who was principal organist (or some title like that) of the Sydney Opera House organ at the time. She gained much enjoyment into her 80s on the roster of pipe organists around various cathedrals around Wollongong. When I was in primary school, Mum organised piano lessons for all 4 of us & I continued those until after we moved in 4th Grade, having progressed as far as 3rd Grade on Piano. Taught me enough about reading music & the basics of sight reading, which I've always appreciated. Church music over the years has meant choirs, musicals (both as performer & later in the pit) & many years of playing bass in various worship teams.
There's a big hole in my musical influences after the early 80's, since I was married @ 20 in '82 & kids (x3) began when we were both 21. Prior to that I guess Countdown through the 70s formed a secular foundation. The biggest influence was from the early Jesus music era with the likes of Barry McGuire, Larry Norman, Randy Stonehill, Chuck Girard, Phil Keaggy & Keith Green. It was when my group of high school friends discovered Keith Green, & one of our crew was a wiz on piano & keyboard, that my previous dabbling on acoustic guitar gravitated towards bass because inspired keyboard musicianship & music was also driven by bass lines that just couldn't be overlooked. I stuck my hand up & got my first bass guitar, an Aria solid bodied violin bass that a mutual school friend was trying to offload. That was in '77 & it's been bass ever since. There were a couple gospel oriented bands, one in high school already mentioned, Cornerstone, & then I joined my brother Vic's band after high school & they rebranded with the name Homebrew. When marriage &, soon after, family arrived my regular gigging days were over by end of '82. It's just been church worship teams since with the occasional helping out friends with their own album releases & adhoc concerts here & there over the years. Work in IT has also meant a couple of overseas contract stints (in US), '94-95 in Dallas, TX, & '14-15 in Dubuque IA. On each of these occasions I've been blessed to be welcomed into the local church worship team & do what I love best - glorifying God with the gifts he's given me & playing a part literally in leading others into His presence. Lockdown has brought about the longest hiatus from regular music I've known, & thankfully now that has afforded some time to explore the mysterious world of luthiery as I begin to work through my HB-4 Hobbit Bass build :-)
A timeline:
1968 Ukelele in 1st Grade, Warialda NSW
1969 Piano lessons begin
1970 1st acoustic guitar
1972 Piano lessons end (3rd grade ACMS), Laurieton NSW
1977 1st bass, Aria solid body violin bass, joined Cornerstone Corrimal High, Wollongong NSW
1980 Ibanez Musician, joined Homebrew
1980-82 besides a few gigs around Illawarra & southern Sydney, Homebrew got involved with prison ministry Broken Chains & performed numerous concerts inside gaols from min to max security, including Berrima, Silverwater, Norma Parker, Long Bay, Goulburn, Parramatta
2003 Ashton AB-1505 5-string became my goto instrument. I love playing it detuned A-D-G-C-F
2014 Godin A5 Ultra SA purchased while we were in Iowa for couple of years. Got it defretted & since then I rarely touch the Ashton 5. I love fretless!
2016 Built fEARful 15/6/1-tube bass cab with True3way x-over. Awesome FRFR cab, I chose the 'tube profile over the standard simply because I'd like to one day also build a 12/6/1 which can be stacked (sideways) on top for an ultimately over-the-top combination to use in every possible situation: 12/6/1, or 15/6/1, or both. I'll most likely never even drive the 15 to its limits, but who doesn't dream of the ultimate rig!
2022 8mths after my 60th b'day received HB-4 kit as 60th birthday gift from my brothers. Currently working slowly towards completing the Hobbit Bass (isn't that what HB stands for?)!