I was a founding member of the Bluegrass Extension Service, a 4-5-person band which played about 1,000 gigs between 1972 and 1998. After starting on banjo from 1972-78, I moved to rhythm guitar and sang lead and occasional tenor. We did a mixture of traditional bluegrass with more "modern" songs we liked, set to bluegrass instrumentation and with vocal harmonies featuring 2-4 male voices (in early years) and two male voices and one female voice (later years). We cut our only album ("The Bluegrass Extension Service: First Time Out") in the late 70s, selling it out within about a year. We stopped playing regularly in the mid-90's, when our last banjo player left the area. Thanks to Pat and Tim Oren, who listened to the band in the 70's, for converting the original LP album to a CD and sending it to me so I could put it up!
We started another album in the early 80's, and (" here") are some cuts from it, together with one 45-minute file that's part of a gig tape from the Brookshire Inn, 1983.
I was president of Mid-Michigan Flight, Inc., a corporation which owned and operated a Mooney M20E "Super 21" aircraft, from 1980 - 1999. I am a commercial pilot with an instrument rating.
Before my son was born, I used to participate in USSA Citizens ski racing. I've given that up for a while, and now play tennis regularly.
For a few years (1994-97 or so) I sometimes spent some winter evenings, occasionally even with my son, David, working on model railroading in our basement, and I occasionally get back to that -- and hope to do it again actively at some point in the future. Some pictures of our very-much-under-construction railway are here.
I started scuba diving in
My son played for several years on a
premier soccer team for the
