ABOUT MATT

I am a tinkerer. Plain and simple.

I have worked in the research & development and engineering groups for many of the legendary Massachusetts audio electronics icons for over 25 years. I started more out of necessity than anything else. One thing led to another, and now I find myself being a web designer, an artist, a guitarist / vocalist and sometimes a contract engineering professional. I have also been seen taking part in the Royal and Ancient ritual of beating the ground with sticks. The un-initiated might refer to this as "playing golf".

As I said, I am a tinkerer, and the biggest driving force behind a tinkerer is a burning question. It's more than just a little nagging query, but a fully-blown obsession. That question is, of course: "How the heck does that work?".

I've always been one to take things apart just for the challenge of putting it back together and having it still behave as desired when I'm finished. Some of those efforts, of course, have been more successful than others. For instance, my dad was not very pleased with me when, at 9 years old, I dismantled a mono tube amp that he had built and turned it into a smoke generator.

With a little (ok, a lot) of guidance from him, I was able to restore said amplifier to a happy state, and was merrily on my way to bigger and better things, like his automobile ... but that's another story.

Somewhere around 1993 I found Usenet. It wasn't long after that that I found a newsgroup called alt.www.webmaster. That was when I started taking apart the Internet. As you can plainly see, it's still working. :-)

Currently I work as a freelance web designer. I design web sites for myself (obviously), other musicians and local businesses. My technical and musical/artistic background lends itself well to creating a quality web presence. If you're interested in seeing some of my handiwork, please contact me.

I also do my best to keep a finger on the pulse of the independent music scene locally, regionally and nationally. I promote shows and workshops, perform, book bands, go to shows, and generally maintain a visible presence in the community. I guess that you could call that "networking". I especially enjoy helping artists to promote themselves, and helping venues provide quality entertainment. However, I am not an agent. I do this simply out of pure selfishness - I like good live music - and I've found it necessary to take matters into my own hands in order to ensure that I can always find it locally.