As Michael Meade will tell you, "It's not the exercising that takes up the time. It's all the stopping and heavy breathing!" We're not really sure why he would tell you that, but he says a lot of things that we don't really understand. But... drummers are like that.

Mike is an adventurer. He is a ponder-er, a "get out there and find out about stuff" kind of person. "Life is all about the experience," he is always saying. "You shouldn't always do the same things. Mix it up a little." And Mike does like to mix it up. He likes to take periodic trips into Williamsburg Va. where he soaks up the atmosphere, but he also likes to ride a horse into the desert, or crawl through an old coal mine, and especially ride an old train.

Mike is the song writer for the band. He plays a lot of different instruments, always looking for some new sound, and some new angle. While you will most often see him with a guitar in his hand, he frequently pulls out things like a hammered dulcimer, lap dulcimer, autoharp, American Indian Flutes, mandolin, banjo, drums of all kinds, and the assorted harmonicas. Someday he would like to try a Japanese Koto and a Sitar.

In 2001, Mike's wife passed away and it had a profound effect on his viewpoint of life. "All those things that I said I'd get to someday, I'm getting to now," he says. "I always thought that there would be time later, but I've learned that it could be, that later never comes." That doesn't mean that Mike is out doing stupid things. Quite the contrary. He appreciates life more, but realizes that you have to chase your dreams and not wait for them to happen.

As a single guy, Mike often jokes when he loses his place in a song on stage, that the girl in the third row smiled at him. "I'd like to meet someone," he says. "But it's not easy when you have a busy and life and spend so much time at either my job or playing music. I'd rather find someone good instead of someone fast anyway. So I don't run around trying to find girls to go out with me, but if someone special comes along and wants to share this crazy life I lead, well, I'd be all for it."

Mike was born in December in the same year that Alan Freed coined the phrase "Rock and Roll." Mike has always felt that there was something significant about that. He doesn't know WHAT is so significant, but there must be a relation. He and his older brother used to sit with their ears up against the speakers of the family hi-fi to hear rock and roll on the radio. When the Beatles came to the Ed Sullivan Show, Mike (like millions of other kids) knew that's what he wanted to do.

It was several years later though when Mike discovered his love of drums. A couple of years of paper routes and lawn mowing bought him a set of drums and life was never the same. His family recognized the dedication and even the talent that he had for it, so they pursued getting him into lessons.

Through his teachers and friends of the family, Mike got the opportunity to play drums with the Don Michael's Orchestra that played Big Band Music for a little while. He also had the opportunity to play with some people in the NBC Orchestra (from the Johnny Carson Show). His high school also had a Big Band Orchestra (called Mood Indigo) and he played with them.

But after graduation, Mike found himself a "real" job and got married, and moved to Texas. There he discovered Country Music, and found that he really liked it. It was there that Mike met Scott Jamison Riley.

It was meeting Scott Riley that moved Mike into the world songwriting and even got him into playing the guitar. Mike starting working with Scott, adding drums to Scott's recordings. Scott played a big Epiphone 12 string guitar. Mike got a guitar, learned three chords (same three that he still knows today) and Scott had them working in restaurant bars around Houston TX. They billed themselves as a duo rock band called "Legend." They sang a lot of cover songs, but also did a number of Scott's original songs on stage. Mike, who had been a poet in high school, decided that he should try to write songs as well. Scott was a great encouragement to him.

At the same time, Mike met Judy Overby and Clyde Mummert who were also musicians. Judy, like Scott, wrote songs while Clyde was just starting to get a foothold in music. They would all gather at Scott's apartment and go through songs. Mike's first song,"Bartender" has still not found a place to be sung, but the second song which he wrote when he found out that Judy was moving away has been recorded by Lackawanna Rail and is part of the CD. It was the birth of Mike's first son that made "Legend" just a legend. Mike's wife wanted to move back to where the family was in New Jersey, so they did so. Mike has never forgotten Scott, and in fact, his youngest son is named after Mike's mentor.

As Mike's kids grew up, there was a long silence from Mike. Toddlers can do that to a musician. They tend to really make it hard to practice. Even though Mike's wife tried to get him to take some time to play his guitar, it was very difficult to really sit down and do much writing. So it was a long time that Mike's guitars sat in their cases.

When the family moved to Pittsburgh, they found a Bluegrass Festival to attend. The first year, they just showed up for one day, but for the following year, and several years after that they camped out for the whole festival, and Mike got his guitar out and started jamming with the performers in the camp ground. Mike enjoyed the good times in the campground and the opportunity to play guitar with some of the great bands of bluegrass. He spent some time playing with the Bluegrass Cardinals and got to meet and work with Brian Bowers as well.

When the family moved back to New Jersey (again) Mike's daughter told her music teacher at school about the bluegrass festivals, and how her dad liked campground pickin'. The teacher knew Ed Dubell was a bluegrass picker and was looking for people to play bluegrass with and he gave Ed Mike's phone number. Ed called, they got together and things have never been the same.

Mike, Ed and his wife Karen started playing together regularly just to see how things would go. Ed mentioned to Mike that the Rock Band that he played with was looking for a drummer. Mike called his mom and made arrangements to pick up his old set of drums from her basement.

Over the next several years, Mike, Ed and Karen worked together in both the Rock Band and continued to play bluegrass.