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I was born Michael Woodhead, 7 April 1947, in the township of Rawtenstall, Lancashire, England.
After I heard the Beatles sing 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand' on the radio in 1963, I started to write lyrics. I soon bought my first guitar, and began to set my lyrics to music. Now, forty-odd years later, I have written over 1000 songs.
I took music theory and a couple of years piano and singing lessons when I was a child, but am basically self-taught.
From 1965 to 1973, I sang my songs--as well as top ten hit parade songs from the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s--in public parks, private parties, on radio and television, in hotel lounges, restaurants, and anywhere that people who wanted music were willing to invite me.
In December 1973, I became a Christian. I began to write Christian songs, and soon began to sing my music, as well as lead praise and worship, in various denominations and congregations--Full Gospel, Pentecostal, Catholic Charismatic, Anglican, Salvation Army, Presbyterian, Baptist, and others--and in various Christian coffee houses, at Bible studies, and other spiritual venues until 1990. Around that time, I began to question a lot of things about the dogma and beliefs of the Christian church, and I now consider myself to be a Charismatic Christian Agnostic--'a person who is immensely attracted by Christ and who seeks to show his spirit, to meet the challenges, hardships and sorrows of life in the light of that spirit, but who, though he is sure of many Christian truths, feels that he cannot honestly and conscientiously “sign on the dotted line” that he believes certain theological ideas about which some branches of the church dogmatize; churches from which he feels excluded because he cannot “believe.” His intellectual integrity makes him say about many things, “It may be so. I do not know.” ' (Leslie D Weatherhead)
I create my music with a Yamaha 12-string guitar, a Roland XP-50 music workstation; a Casio LK-30 keyboard; and software programs that include the IDD Internet TapeDeck 2003 XP; Finale; and Steinberg's Cubase VST/32 Music Creation & Production System.
These days, I'm in the process of orchestrating the 1000+ songs I've already written, a daunting enough task as it is, but highly fulfilling nonetheless
From 1998 to 2004, I wrote New Age music reviews for Calgary's Synchronicity magazine, and about six months for the on-line music review site, Wind and Wire. I also have my own music site called Lux Aeterna where I review various New Age and other releases on a sporadic basis.
All of my tunes have a very melodic, light folk-pop feel to them.
Over the years, I have attempted to land a recording contract, but so far this dream has eluded my grasp. The reaction from various record companies has been pretty much the same--"We like your music, but it's not what we're looking for at the present time".
Although my appreciation of music spans many genres, my favourite is New Age music, particularly Space and Ethereal.
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