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Keith Sanford and his black box: Biography |
Biography
People may know Keith Sanford as the Baylor psychology professor who studies romantic relationships. But when the muses beckon, he transforms into a musician performing a fusion of electronic jazz standards with modern rhythm loops. His original songs are distinct for lyrics that have weight. He often performs with a black box that contains synthesizers, percussion pads, and loop-station equipment mounted inside.|
His musical history is unique in that, for many years, his primary instrument was the drums. He began playing drums and piano in the seventies growing up in Boulder, Colorado. In the early eighties, he moved to Hollywood California and attended a music school located on Hollywood Boulevard two blocks from the famous Chinese Theater. There, he studied techniques for playing drums in odd rhythmical time signatures with Ralph Humphrey, a former drummer for Frank Zappa. Subsequently, Keith played drums for several rock bands based out of the Los Angeles area. He also spent a few years touring the Western United States and Canada playing big-band style show music for several three-ring circuses. He got his singing debut at a circus performance in a stadium with tigers and elephants when the scheduled singer suddenly quit, someone needed to sing the closing song, and Keith was handed the microphone. In the nineties, he began expanding his musical repertoire, studying music theory and vocal performance at Los Angeles Valley College, and then later at Seattle Pacific University. Since then, he has spent many hours writing and recording music in his home studio, and has gradually placed more emphasis on work with piano and voice than with drums. Yet, whether he is performing with his electronic music equipment in his black box, or simply sitting at an acoustic piano to sing, there is always a distinctive rhythmical quality to his music that comes from his roots as a drummer. |
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When teaching psychology, Keith Sanford sings songs about statistics. |