Sharon Brown was a teenager when she first began working for Ted Brown Music. While in high school she met and began dating the founder’s son, Warren. Soon she discovered she had a real...
Reese Marin is the president of Bellevue American Music in the Seattle suburb of Bellevue, Washington. The store reflects Reese's passion for music with carefully designed display space ...
Al Di Meola has long been known for his impeccable technique, perfect sense of rhythm and timing, and lightning fast displays of guitar virtuoso. Al has also become a very unique and mult...
Donn Bennett had the happy "accident" of falling into the retail music business. As a young drummer he had to pay for his own lessons, which led to him teaching drums to some of his frie...
Herb Trawick and Dave Pensado became lifelong friends after meeting in a lobby of a recording studio in Los Angeles. Both were looking for a gig in music and exchanged contact numbers. ...
Randy Fuchs has a boundless depth of knowledge about the music industry that spans over 30 years involving countless products, industry players, and artists. Randy started at a young age ...
Scott Summerhays was the President of the company his parents established in Salt Lake City back in 1936. Scott and his brother Briant worked together to grow the family business and even...
Larry Manley first met the former CEO for NAMM, Larry (Link) Linkin, while he was working at a bank in Escondido, California where Link held NAMM's business accounts. It was during a time...
Niclas Luthman has a long history in the music industry. Beginning in 1989 at a NAMM show, Niclas started his distribution company by "accidentally" taking on the M-Audio line for Scandin...
Ted Berquist had a touch with fame in the 1960s with the group, the Novas. Their song, “The Crusher” was picked up by the national billboard charts and shot the group to stardom. After th...
Mark Dunkley is the president of Dunkley Music Inc. in Boise, Idaho. In fact this is just one of three locations that are situated along southern Idaho. Mark's parents opened the first ...
Gary Winder has been active in music sales for over 30 years. Gary worked with G. Leblanc and Coda Music Technologies before he moved on in 1997 to join Yamaha, finally serving as Directo...
Niko Bolas has been a key producer and studio engineer in the music industry since the late 70s. In 1979, Niko started Record One Studios where he went to record a number of influential g...
Jerry Grochowski was dedicated to the efficiency of Hal Leonard’s production and distribution operations. His service to the company involved working with many of the processes still in p...
Anthony Ortega was a mainstay on the west coast jazz scene beginning in the 1940s. Growing up in Watts, Anthony (known as Tony) went to school with and was exposed to many of the era's Lo...
Benny Turner grew up in a music family and after his brother, Freddie King, took him to a session with Howlin’ Wolf and Willie Dixon, he was hooked. While Benny played guitar with the Kin...
Al Maniscalco is a musician at heart. Prior to joining what was then Buffet Crampon USA in 2006, Al Maniscalco maintained a successful 20 year career as a performing musician and educator...
Tim Jones brings both passion and a dedication to the customers he serves in Texas. Starting his first store in Midland in 2003, Tim expanded to the communities of Odessa and Abilene. Tim...
Jody Espina had a long history as both a musician and educator before deciding to launch his own line of saxophone and clarinet mouthpieces. Jody honed his playing at a young age before m...
Doug Davis has been involved in the music industry for most of his life. Getting the bug to play while playing in the Honor band in school, Doug went on to get a degree in music education...
Charles Conrad comes from a very long line of music retailers. Charles’ grandfather started the store in 1890 and it has been in the same location since. Having seen years of change in th...
Abe Thomas has shown remarkable insight and made great strides forward in the music therapy arena. Able to identify a unique instrument, the OmniChord, and immediately see its value to no...
Bill Putnam Jr essentially grew up in the music business. Bill’s father, Bill Putnam Sr., started Universal Audio in 1958 and was basically the inventor of the modern day recording consol...
Ray Parker Jr may best be known for writing the soundtrack to Gostbusters, but his legacy goes back much further. Starting in Detroit as a teenager, Ray got the opportunity to work and to...
Loren Zimmerman owned Byerly Music in Peoria, Illinois during the 1970s and 80s and is credited for being among the first music retailers to have locations in shopping malls. When he pur...
Randy Wood is the president of The Music Shoppe in Normal, Illinois. The store specializes in band instrument repairs and strong customer service. The store goes back to the days when a ...
Carl Thacker was a teenager when he began repairing band instruments. In fact he was a Charter Member of NAPBIRT and attended the first annual convention before he was 20 years old. Aft...
Craig Schertz worked for Byerly Music in Peoria, Illinois and saw an opportunity to purchased two of the company’s ten locations when his boss and the current owner, Loren Zimmerman, was ...
Andrew Schertz runs Schertz MusiCenteR in Bloomington, Illinois, with this father Randy. Andrew's uncle, Craig, once owned Byerly Music, which had locations throughout Centeral Illinois....
Julie Jurgenson is among the pioneering women in the band instrument repair side of the music industry. She was trained at Red Wing and worked for a couple of shops before opening her ow...
