During his youth, Jamie was taught by his parents that the most important thing in life was to have a profession in order to provide a firm foundation for raising a family and long lasting security for a good life.
He followed in his father and grandfather’s footsteps and studied accounting. From his first accounting job, he realized this was not for him and started to become depressed. As time went on, his depression subsided with the help of many personal growth workshops, but he continued in a career that he had no passion for, and was losing his spark for life. Even his passion for listening to music had begun to fade. Then, in his mid thirties, he was exposed to the hand drum at a gathering of a friend. He remembers losing himself in the group’s rhythm and its energy. Eventually this led to purchasing a hand drum when he was 38. He chose a Doumbek (Middle Eastern drum) since he had some exposure to it through his wife who had been a belly-dance instructor in her early life.
He took his first drum lesson at a belly-dance festival a month later. In that class, he was able to catch on, and so his passion for the drum began. He soon found a music teacher, Sonhail Kaspar, and started developing good technique and learned many of the rhythms and percussion instruments of the Middle East. For the first time in his adult life, he felt he was good at something, and had some real promise.
Still an accountant, he remembers bringing his Doumbek onto planes when he had to travel to other cities as a consultant on accounting software. He would play anywhere he could; at parks in the winter; between big rigs parked outside the hotel for the night; in client’s offices when everyone went home, and in rental cars.
At UCLA, he played with the Near East Ensemble led by Dr. Jihad Racy and met other mulit-ethnic students, and with this ensemble he discovered the beauty and depth of the music of Arabic countries. At the same time, his wife Melanie started belly dancing again and they began to collaborate. At a party his wife threw to promote her dance school, he was introduced to an Israeli composer and Oud (Middle-Eastern lute) player, named Yuval Ron. Unbeknownst to him, this was the meeting that started his music career. One and a half years later he met Yuval again at a Middle Eastern Music & Dance Camp in Mendocino, CA and they began to play together. Yuval was asked to do a performance for Peace in the Middle East and invited Jamie to join him. This was going to be the first time Yuval would perform the Oud in a concert, and the first time in 15 years Yuval would perform live. The concert was successful and it was the first time that Jamie would get paid for a performance. With Yuval’s experience and connections in the music world, and his passion for Middle Eastern music, he attracted some very experienced Arabic and Armenian musicians to join him, and in 2001, he formed the Yuval Ron Ensemble.
On Jamie’s 40th birthday, he was talking with a friend and shared with him the desire that some day he was going to make music his career and drop accounting for good. Jamie had gotten to a point in his life where he was unwilling to have a career that he had no passion for, and was ready to go for it, no matter what; but that day had still not arrived.
But about five years later, that longed-for day did finally arrive, and he asked for his wife’s blessing to make that dream come true, so for the next 13 years, Jamie fought and worked harder than ever before in his life, overcoming many financial, health, and emotional obstacles. Through it all, he created a music career where he has now played in over 20 groups with fine musicians from all over the world, recorded on over 200 recording dates, and has performed in Israel, Jordan, Morocco, Spain, Poland, South Korea, Turkey, Alaska, Cuba, India, Armenia, and across the US.
Most importantly, he has touched thousands of people with the message that no matter what we have been taught to believe, music expresses the commonality of the human spirit, and thus develops our compassion for each other. Although the music business is up and down, and with no security, he has transformed his life from one with no sense of purpose, where the light was growing dim, to one filled with a passion for life, and a love for humanity.
Jamie can be reached at [email protected], or 310 463-1956.