W. Michael Boyd

Arranger, Pianist, Husband, Dad...

I began playing the piano at an early age. I took formal piano lessons until the age of 14. When I started high school I was very average and wasn’t progressing much. I stopped taking lessons and focused on High School Band. I played Clarinet in Middle School and switched to Tuba my freshman year. I didn’t get back into playing the piano until I heard about the High School Jazz Band. There was an opening for a piano player so I signed up.

Jazz piano is very difficult to learn and much harder to master. I would not say I’m a great jazz pianist but one thing it really taught me to do was improvise. Most of the hymn arrangements on this site is me at the piano, without much thought, playing the song through 1-2 times, adding a bunch of improvisational notes and recording it. With Jazz music all you are given is chord changes. This forces you to use your ear and interpret your thoughts into the music. After playing jazz piano in high school, I played a little in college but pursued a different occupational degree.

I have a beautiful family with a wife and 4 kids. I’m from Orlando, FL but reside in South Carolina. My day job is selling software.