Our Roots

As a young child growing up in Charleston, South Carolina I was exposed to musicians in my church. I remember relishing going to church on Sunday mornings where I would watch the musicians play their instruments with admiration and amazement. This early exposure to live musicianship sparked an interest in music that led to a lifelong love of musical creation and performance. 

 

During those formative years, I benefited enormously from that exposure. I also benefited from the generous gifts of those who saw an early passion for music in me. They saw potential in me to become a musician, and they nurtured that passion. I was given a toy drum set by the organist of my church and later given a real drum set by my father at the early age of seven. As I grew up, I was fortunate to be able to receive percussion lessons and to have opportunities to perform as a musician. Now, I still enjoy every opportunity I have to play my drums or to make music tinkering around with one of the many instruments I’m fortunate to have.  

 

I founded Swintone with the generous help of my family and friends to provide musical opportunities similar to the ones I had growing up. My vision for Swintone is for it to be a reliable organization for resources to promote musicianship among children in Charleston and in military families across the country. We strongly believe in nurturing the musical curiosity and talents of interested youth. We want to create opportunities for children to discover their own love of musicianship. We believe that by equipping them with proper instruments, offering them opportunities for engaging instruction, and by providing them other support services, Swintone can effectively jumpstart the musical growth of 100s of young musicians.