I love music. I love all kinds of music. I have reasonably diverse tastes, but I tend to go through phases. Here is a fragmented and incomplete history of my musical interests.

When I was young my grandparents got me a little record player. I had 45RPM records of things like Johnny Horton's "Battle of New Orleans." Those are my earliest memories of having my own music. As you can see, I was off to an auspicious start.

I remember my dad playing The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" at his Christmas party one year, and Albert Tyler dancing to it. (Albert, if you are out there, I just want to say that you are a great dancer!) I still know all of the lyrics to it.

I first started buying albums through my father's subscription to Columbia House. I think the first one I bought myself was Neil Diamond's "Hot August Night." Ahem. Well. I was a kid. Give me a break.

The first decent album I got was The Wall. I loved that the lyrics were written in that weird handwriting that was on the inside of the album. Oh my God, I used to play it over and over. I literally wore out my first copy of the album. From Pink Floyd my musical taste again dropped off sharply, and I started listening to Styx ("This really is Hell!").

Then the 80's. Ah, the 80s, time of leg warmers, layers, feathered hair, and those pointy suede boots. <cough> Whodini and Run DMC. Duran Duran, The Go Gos, Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Earnest political music (thanks to Band Aid, Live Aid and AUAA) like "Do They Know It's Christmas and "Sun City" got me listening to artists I had never heard of, like The Boomtown Rats (yay Bob Geldof! I heard "I Don't Like Mondays" walking down Front St. the day before I wrote this paragraph), Ultravox, The Hooters, George Clinton, Lou Reed.

I had a rebellious year in grade 9. It lasted from October until the following June. During that time I bought three albums without hearing them, based only on what Spin magazine had written about them: Wall of Voodoo's "Seven Days in Sammystown" (still one of my favourite albums), Midnight Oil's "Red Sails in the Sunset," Suicidal Tendencies' album (the one with Institutionalized. I'M NOT CRAZY!), and Fear's "More Beer." (Another parenthetical bit of trivia: Lee Ving, the lead growler of Fear, played Mr. Body in that really stupid Clue movie with Tim Curry.) That was when I got all depressed and moody and started drawing little anarchy symbols on my jeans. Gee, listening to Suicidal Tendencies, The Smiths and The Cure... how did that happen? What perfect bands for dramatic teenage angst.

I played bass in a band in high school. I suffered through endless practices of Led Zeppelin material. We played one party. Eventually I got busy and started another job, so my bandmates (mercifully, for me as well as them I am sure) replaced me. I hated Led Zeppelin before, but I hate them even more now that I have been forced to play "Whole Lotta Love" over and over and over and over and over and over.

Luckily I met Bandit, who at the time was a Burgermeister and a Peter Gabriel fan. He turned me on to lots of cool music at the time: Jean-Michel Jarre, Yello, XTC... them's the ones.

We won't talk about my Rocky Horror phase.

Fast forward to the next big change in my musical tastes. I was introduced to Celtic music and I fell in love. This was where I really got into being a musician: I learned to play the concertina, then the highland bagpipes, and then I became obssessed with bagpipes: at one point I owned multiple sets of highland pipes, a set of Scottish Small Pipes, an uilleann practice set, a set of Northumbrian pipes, a set of English Great Pipes, a variety of whistles, and way more photocopied music than I really ever needed. I had some amazing, magical experiences at Hamish Moore's piping schools, and I even put one on one year. I have been told by no less than Colin MacLellan that I was "ruining highland piping." Yay me!

I started out listening to the Tannahill Weavers (and promoted two of their concerts) and Silly Wizard because they were traditional with a modern flair. Then I got into obscure Scottish music that only serious, committed Celtic musicians would ever dream of listening to. It's great stuff. :)

Then: pagan and lesbian music. Charlie Murphy, The Indigo Girls, Melissa Etheridge, k.d. lang, Tori Amos (okay, not lesbian, but close enough). And along with that (don't ask why) medieval music.

Next stop? Middle Eastern music! I started studying the doumbek with my friend Don, who was a good drummer and an excellent teacher. I have incredibly fond memories of the drumming classes at his house. At one point I was a decent drummer, good enough that George Sawa told me to study with somebody better. I've lost a lot of that because I don't practice any more, but I still have some drums and am just getting started with it again. I have a page here on which I talk about some of the different rhythms I learned. You can also hear samples of me playing them. These were originally for an instructional site that I was putting together. Maybe one day I will put together just that site!

My interests in Celtic and Middle Eastern music (and a trip to a crystals-and-berries shop in Hampton, VA) introduced me to Dead Can Dance, who became my all time favourite artist. I love their voices and I love their music. And I appreciate that they continue to make their own music even if they are not together any more.

In the late 1990's my train derailed again, because my brother William Dieter loaned me the CDs of Nick Warren in Prague and Paul Oakenfold in New York, and my current love affair with trance began. Bill also gave me his first demo tape. I still have it and still get amazing warm fuzzies when I listen to it. I listened to trance constantly for three or four years. Sometimes I would venture into progressive house or atmospheric drum and bass, but usually I stayed with trance.

I have recently become keen on highland piping again, and on Pride weekend 2003 I joined the Church Street Pipe Band. It's a band that is made up of members and supporters of the gay and lesbian community. Everybody is so sweet and nice! I can't wait to get going again.