My name is Johnathan J. Stegeman/MidiMacMan, and I am a composer, webmaster, photographer, graphic artist, and freelance writer from Denver, Colorado.
I am have been playing the piano since age five, and while I have had no classical or "formal" piano training, my self taught technique has been shaped mostly by ear, and my love for improvisational styles mixed in with fundamental theories about chord structures and harmonies.
I have faced great criticism for my approach to piano playing, and for particularly for the music I compose. Perhaps it is just rubbish, and will one day make a mockery out of my name-my Mother's name as I had no father growing up, and have grown up with the German half of my heritage knowning little of my my other roots, Mexican-or I may just be onto something that is ahead of the time. The later scenario at least maintains hope, and without that little bit of reassurance, I could not hardly keep writing music. Without writing music, I wouldn't feel but maybe a fraction of the person I am.
For you see music is my greatest passion, and therefore greatest source of sorrow, despair and frusration at times. It has occured to me that my songs may be loved by even just a few other souls, after I have passed through this human existence.......sadly this happens to many more artists that you may have ever imagined.
However, they never give up their motivation, as if forced by a etheral force to continue their artistic expression. Almost a curse it can feel at times, but I don't think that any artist, wether successfful, or not, would trade in this unseen force for anything in the world. I know for example: I would not trade my sense of hearing in for my sense of sight. But what a foolish bargain most people would agree............I cannot help the fact that my music is so much of me.
Only in the last two years, and after great rejection by the music world, despite rigorous study through high school, and three years of study at the University of Colorado at Denver, have Itaken up other artistic expressions. Web Design, Graphic Design, Freelance writing, and even advertising and product development are skills that I had no real training with, even through college. These skills have been fashioned through my own quest for knowledge, and are quite immature in development stages. Yet I am proud of where I have come, especially for the skills I have learned on my own.
What it has taught me, is that the world is anyones oyster........and you can harvest whatever riches you may admire...........with work and with the simplest desire.
Thanks for noticing perhaps something in my work. It all adds up to make all my effort have some final worth.
Sincerely, Johnathan J. Stegeman MidiMacMan Website
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