How I got here.
Music. The Army. Real estate. Now software.
I run Total Ventures, a product studio. Previously at Fender Musical Instruments. Thirteen years in the U.S. Army National Guard.
The Sound
Fourteen years as a professional jazz guitarist. Led my own trio, taught at Winthrop University, played for BMW and Boeing, and earned an M.M. from USC.
Jazz trio
Blues in Green — SC National Guard
In the studio
Peace Center for the Performing Arts, Greenville SC
The Service
Thirteen years in the U.S. Army National Guard. Promoted to Senior Logistics and Resource Management NCO, running supply for a 35-soldier unit. The discipline stuck.
Army Band
USS Yorktown Aircraft Carrier
The Pivot
I ran operations for a Keller Williams team in Asheville — $9M in closings over two years. Moved to LA and worked production on Super Bowl LVI commercials for Dolby Atmos, Chevy, FedEx, and Lowe’s. Sold Microsoft at Best Buy. Lived in Costa Rica raising my son.
Super Bowl LVI production, Los Angeles
Asheville, NC
Costa Rica
The Build
I taught myself to code four years ago. My first job was an eCommerce relaunch. Then Fender — building for Fender, Jackson, and PreSonus, and writing an internal AI CLI for our engineering team. Now I run Total Ventures.
Current projects
Inky
AI storytelling app for kids. iOS and web. Gemini + Imagen pipeline.
Pregnancy Power Hour
My wife's consulting business. Content pipeline turns one video into a blog post, newsletter, and social.
The F1 Formula
Automated F1 news site. RSS to AI summary to published with newsletter.
ShadowBrain
My agent stack. Claude skills, specialist agents, and a Go CLI.
I started playing bass in a punk band with a blue mohawk when I was 11. I stole my parents’ car to go buy my first guitar.
That same energy is still running the show.
I live with my wife Brittany and our son Jupiter. When I’m not building, I’m thinking about fly fishing, Montana, or the next thing I want to figure out.
p.s. It’s pronounced “su-gran-iss”