Touring musician who graduated from Berklee College Of Music with major label cuts, tens of millions of streams and a decade of teaching experience gives lessons in voice.

Find out more about Jonathan

• 1) When did you first develop a passion for music and your favorite instrument?

  I first developed a passion for music when I was 13 years old in middle school! I fell in love with playing the drums and quickly decided, I wanted to be a multi-instrumentalist and learn how to play guitar, bass, piano, and sing! It was initially rock music that I was drawn to, but since then I’ve opened my ears to a much broader range of music!

• 2) Is there a particular type of music or artist that you listen to on a loop without it driving you crazy?

  I don’t really have a specific artist or style that I listen to on repeat anymore, but I do have individual songs that will really connect with me and I will never get sick of. I will never get sick of faithfully by journey, every breath you take by the police, high and dry by Radiohead, unforgettable by Nat “King” Cole, and a ton of other classics! I’m really just drawn to songs that are timeless and can be great in any era!

• 3) Explain to us the most difficult or riveting course you could personally give to a student of music.

  I think the most difficult or riveting course I could personally give any music student has to do with writing or producing music for radio chart purposes. I think that developing skill and a musical ability are far easier than developing refined taste that translates to pop radio, and the masses. I think that’s far more difficult than any other thing in music - writing songs that millions of people can connect to.

• 4) What do you think is the most complicated instrument to master and why?

  This is sort of a cop out answer that I’m going to give in response to the question. But, I don’t necessarily think mastering guitar is any more difficult than piano or drums or the saxophone. I think the most difficult thing to do on any instrument is create your own voice. The key from transitioning between a good musician on an instrument to a great musician on an instrument is having your own unique imprint. That’s the most difficult thing anyone can do on any instrument.

• 5) What are your keys to success?

  I think there are two fundamental keys to being successful at anything. I think those two keys are being harder working than your peers and being egoless. I think if you’re willing to learn from other people and grow to the best of your ability then anything is achievable.

• 6) Name three musicians you dream of meeting in your favourite bar in the early hours of the morning. Explain why.

  I would love to have met Eddie Van Halen because he is my subjective greatest guitarist of all time. I would also have loved to meet John Lennon and Michael Jackson, arguably the two greatest songwriters of all time. My primary purpose of meeting all of these legends is to learn something that I feel like I couldn’t learn from anyone else. Given the fact that these three people are the greatest at what they each did, respectively, I think they’d be able to teach me something I couldn’t learn from anybody else.

• 7) Provide a valuable anecdote related to music or your days at music school.

  When I first started working in the music industry, the renowned songwriter Sam Martin took me under his wing to mentor me as a producer and songwriter and years after we started working together he told me he didn’t start working with me in the first place because he thought I was talented. He started working with me because he thought I worked harder than everybody else and that’s my work ethic that allowed me to become what people perceived to be talented.

• 8) What are the little touches that make you a Superprof in music?

  I think that any teacher or Professor and anything can teach a single skill. I think it’s easy for a guitar teacher to teach a student how to play guitar. I think what differentiates between a Professor and a super prof is that the latter can teach and apply lessons from an individual musical instrument to anything in the student’s life. I think being a great teacher goes far beyond helping the student with one skill. I think being a great professor is about teaching valuable habits, and helping the student learn what they truly want out of what you’re teaching them and out of life.