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Life in St. Louis
After spending most of my life on the East Coast, Ben and I bought our first house in Tower Grove East, St. Louis, about 5 years ago, where we live now with our daughter Chloe, born March 16, 2008!!, and our large, lovable Bernese Mountain dog Toby. During the day, I'm an IT contractor  doing programming at Anheuser-Busch, and Ben's finishing his intern year in general medicine at Saint Louis University Hospital. We're involved with a young church called The Journey, where I play with a band for Sunday services about twice a month. We'll be in St. Louis through summer of 2008, then it's off to Cleveland, where Ben will start at the Cleveland Clinic as a resident in ophthalmology.  Besides music, I love to cook and read and run in the park with Toby. I also love languages and cultures, though both are somewhat dormant at the moment (besides computer languages and geek culture at work!). I spent time in France, Taiwan and Chad in college, and Ben and I lived in Syria the first year we were married. We still hope to go back to the Middle East for an extended period of time at some point when he finishes medical school.
Musical highlights of the last couple years include finally taking official cello lessons (after Ben surprised me by buying my cello as a Christmas present!) and a music theory class at Webster University. I'm always looking for places to play and people to play with, so get in touch with me if you have information in either of those categories!
A bit of Jo's story
 My parents clearly had early musical aspirations for me, as you can see! My mom wanted to start me on piano when I was 4, but the academy where she took me said I was too young, so I ended up with violin instead. I was taught a modified Suzuki method, where ear training was emphasized, but we also learned to read music. By the time we left Champaign for New Jersey when I was 8, I had finished book 4 and the Vivaldi A minor violin concerto and had resigned myself to being asked to play for every family friend who came into town (sigh!).
Through junior high and high school in New Jersey, I studied violin and piano fairly seriously, and after befriending a flutist in music camp after 7th grade, I took up the flute later that year. Those years were marked by auditions and competitions and the sense that I never measured up in the classical arena. When I went to college, I put music aside and didn't rediscover it until just a few years ago. At Dartmouth, I did sing in an a cappella group called X.ado, of which I have many fond memories. Renaissance
 I unexpectedly found music again when I showed up on a whim with my violin to a jam session at the Journey. Worship came alive for me - I challenge anyone to listen to Josh Dix and Erin Moore do All Creatures of Our God and King without longing to know this God and King. I was honored to be part of the recording of that first Journey CD.
I started writing music in September 2004 in response to a number of highly emotional events. Sorrow, joy, longing, expectation, awe, pleading - all found their way into themes that I didn't know I could write. I'm still not sure where I'm going with composition, but I know that there are some things that can't be expressed in any other way for me. My dearest dream is that my work might show someone a glimpse of the heartbreaking beauty found in the least reflection of the Creator. Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
And only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries. - Elizabeth Barrett Browning
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