Percussion History When Chris was 3 years old, like most, he became consciously aware of his existence. His earliest memories are of his father’s music store, Harris Music, in Atlanta GA. When Chris reached 8, he wasn’t asked “Do you want to learn a musical instrument?”, instead the question was, “Which musical instrument do you want learn?” First he tried trumpet, but soon realized that he didn’t like the headaches caused by blowing air into the small mouth piece. A year later he chose percussion, because every other instrument offered in school required blowing into some little mouth piece. Like most percussionist, lessons started with a pair of size 2B drumsticks and a rubber practice pad. Then in middle school the other drummers began to get serious, the rubber pad was history and every student went for the drum set. After showing much enthusiasm, his father got him his first drum set. During this time, Chris began private lessons with jazz drummer Gibbi Lobe. After a year of private lessons, he was on his way to discover his own style. High school consisted of Marching band, jazz band, and concert band. His favorite band was his puck/alternative band Absolute Abanded. When he was a senior in high school he began teaching at Boca Ciega High school. During this time, he began his DCI (Drum Corps International) education. The summers of 92 and 93, he was a touring snare drummer and featured soloist for the Magic Drum and Bugle corps. During these years Chris had the opportunity to study under some of the finest percussionist teachers in the Florida region. After returning home from drum corps, he returned to his drum set and played in many  alternative rock bands in the Tampa bay area. Chris continued to teach for many of the local high schools and teach privately. In December of 1995 he began performing his bucket show for the thousand of party goers on 7th Avenue in Ybor City, FL. For two years he never missed a weekend night in Ybor City.   Then it was time to hit the road. Chris, with the help of Julio “Klown” Santiago of the USA Break Dancers, was taught the ins and outs of street performing. Since then, Chris has been seen in most of the Southeast US. Cities include, Tampa, Clearwater, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Daytona, Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, Gainesville, Naples, Key West, Atlanta, Athens, Macon, Savannah, Charlotte, Chapel Hill, Spartanburg, Nashville, Mobile, Birmingham, New Orleans, Boulder, and some that he doesn’t remember.

Personal History I was born on May 30, 1972. Childhood held many fond memories and influences for me. My father was a music major in college and is a jazz woodwind player. He also owned Harris Music store in the Atlanta area. I remember spending a lot of time there. The shopping complex where his store was located had a movie theater, a record store, and a drug store. So when the music stuff got boring, I was in the record store looking at Kiss albums or in the movie theater watching Star Wars for the fourth or fifth time. I also remember my father giving me and my older brother only one dollar to go down to the drug store to buy a coke and candy bar for each of us. If he gave us two dollars, then it was toy time. The drug store had one of those inexpensive toy sections. The most memorable time in the store is when I had thrown a few coins into my mouth. You can guess what came next. I started to choke with a coin lodged in my throat. My parents ran to my rescue.  Mom had her finger down my throat and dad had me bent over his leg beating on my back. Luck was on my side that day. The coin flew out of my mouth and I swore to never put a coin in my mouth ever again. I learned at a young age that money has the power to kill.   When I was five, my parents gave up the store and moved us to St. Petersburg, FL. My father continued to work in the music business with other music stores in the Tampa bay area and worked gigs with his horns. Like most kids, I played out side with the other kids in the neighborhood and hated homework. While in third grade I chose to learn to play the trumpet, after a year of this, no lessons either, I decided to learn percussion. Formal drum lessons started at age 9 in the forth grade. My first teacher was actually named Mr. Drum. I remember lessons in reading and rudiments. One of his first lessons, he would have us put white chalk on the tips of our sticks, play 5 and 9 stroke rolls and count the white marks on our practice pads. I was lucky enough to experience my first job at age 10. For two years I was a paperboy for the Evening Independent, which was the afternoon edition of the St. Petersburg Times. My job consisted of riding my bike up and down 54th Ave and 58th Street, visiting bars and selling papers to their customers. The paper cost 15 cents, the boss got a dime and I got a nickel plus tips. What great stories I have to tell about this one. Christmas Eve was the best. I would work all day and almost every customer would give me a dollar for each newspaper. I would ride my bike home and empty my pockets to make room for more money. I think I visited each bar 3 times that day. Video games were important part of my childhood. I grew up with the Atari 2600, and then moved on to the Commodore 64. With a pocket full of quarters that I made on my paper route, much time was spent at the arcades. I also played sports. I spent two years playing little league soccer. I loved the practice and the games. After soccer, it was time to get serious about my drumming.     Most of middle school was spent with drum lessons and skateboarding.   I remember the bones brigade videos with young Tony Hawk. One family allowed the kids in the neighborhood to build a half pipe in the back yard. Many hours were spent building, skating, wreaking, and repairing the half pipe. These were great times. I attended Dixie Hollins High School. After the freshmen year, the skateboarding lost its place to cars and jobs. My neighborhood friends were growing up and each of us started going different ways. My first teen job was at Winn Dixie bagging groceries and chasing shopping carts. One night, the manager had me mopping up blood from the meat department. Not a spill, but a pool of blood, I felt like I was cleaning up a crime scene. I dropped the mop, walked out, and never returned. My next job was at AMC Theater at Tyrone Square Mall. Here I developed a deeper passion for entertainment.  My senior year my new girlfriend got me a job working for a video store called Video Premier in Seminole. In my last semester of my senior year, I landed my first professional teaching job at Boca Ceiga High School under the direction of Frank Williams. During this time, Frank Williams was the horn caption head of The Cadets. I spent three years teaching under his guidance. All of us who has every worked with Frank would say there is a fine line between genius and mad. His musical influence will follow me to my grave.   Along with teaching, I would always have another job. I went back to AMC for a little while and then found a job a Westcoast Video.  During this job, I meet a customer who taught Aikido. Aikido is a Japanese martial art that is very complex. I feel in love with the defensive techniques that we learned. The life lessons that I got from Aikido has made me into what I am today. I apply aikido to my everyday life and it in evident in my drumming. Along with teaching, I started my higher education at St. Petersburg Jr. College pursuing a degree in business. Shortly my education took a back seat to Drum and Bugle Corps (DCI). Drum corps is considered to be top gun of marching bands. It is a national youth organization consisting of corps from all over the country which competes at major arenas all summer long across the US. I marched with the Magic of Orlando. We would meet once or twice a month during the winter to practice. When school got out, drum corps became my life. A typical day started by getting woken up at 7am on a school gymnasium floor. After breakfast, the corps would do a long stretch and muscle toning workout. Then hours of marching practice with a 35 pound or heavier drum strapped to your waist would follow. Lunch consisted of a walk to the chuck wagon, gab a sandwich, and eat it on the way back to drumline practice. We did more hours of drumming and marching till it was time for dinner. Sunburn was on top of sunburns. We had an hour or so to eat, shower, get into uniform, and be on the buses ready for the next show. We would unload the buses, report to warm up and prepare for the show. After the show and the award ceremony, we would load up the buses, sleep 4 hours on the bus, arrive at another school, sleep some more on the gym floor, and start all over again. The overweight guys would lose over 50 pounds and the skinny guys would lose up to 20 pounds. We weren’t here for the accommodations; we were here for the love of music. The crazy things that happen in drum corps are endless. We are talking about having over 120 members and staff living together for over two months. Only one can imagine what could happen in that type of environment. Drum corps offers live lessons that can’t be experienced anywhere else. After retuning home from the road in 1993, my percussion life took a different turn. I entered in to the best drummer of Tampa bay contest held at a club in Seminole. This was great, I entered in with my DCI snare drum solo and cleaned house. One drum ruled over all those double bass set players. I was awarded a five piece Lugwig drumset as a first place prize. Now with a new set, it was time to start up the rock band. I stopped teaching, and when I figured out that the band wasn’t going to pay the rent, I got a job answers phones at Home Shopping Network. At the network, I meet my first wife. Within less then a year, I quit the phones and went back to the schools to teach percussion. During this time, I finished my AA from St. Petersburg Jr. College. In December of 1995, a close childhood friend informed me of the bucket drummers from New York in Ybor City. I grabbed a bucket, sticks, coffee can, cowbell, and went to Ybor and started working on my show. With so much going on, my aikido training on the mat would have to wait. Not soon after, my son was born. Now more motivated then ever, it was time to discover new and profitable places for my show.  Three years and twenty cities later, my daughter was born and I graduated from USF with a degree in Business Finance. Now with college out of the way, I was time to return to my aikido training under the United States Aikido Federation. The marriage ended in divorce soon after. (But that is another story to tell on a later date). For three years I took custody of both my children and continued to push forward as a single father. In 2005, I meet my new wife, Christen, at Clearwater beach. We fell deeply in love. We got married on January 22, 2007. Life has been wonderful. If I was to tell you about her, she would need her own website. She is the best.   Nowadays, i spend my time working hard to improve the bucket show (and it's venues), and training hard in Aikido, with hopes of some day owning my own dojo.