A working professional since the age of fifteen, Steve’s credentials as a jazz composer and artist have been grounded in both real world experience and formal education. He began playing piano in clubs, bars and restaurants in and around Daytona Beach, FL where he won First-Place in the Central Florida Jazz Society Competition, First-Place in the Duke Brown Blues Competition, was awarded “outstanding soloist” and IAJE notifications at several Jazz Festivals, including the FSU Jazz Festival, the UNF Jazz Festivals,  and the Lakeside Jazz Festival. 

Choosing to remain close to family, he accepted a full scholarship to the Florida State University School of Music, where he received both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in jazz piano performance and joined the graduate faculty as an educator in 2009, performing, composing, and recording for the nationally acclaimed Jazz Ensemble I, several smaller chamber music jazz groups, and studying with artist-in-residence Marcus Roberts. 

Upon moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2011, Steve served as an adjunct professor of jazz and popular piano at both Contra Costa College and Diablo Valley College until 2014, when performing opportunities took him down to Los Angeles to music direct the opening of the Beautiful Musical workshop in Los Angeles (2014).

Since then, Steve has remained a highly sought after solo artist, music director, sideman and educator throughout the west coast. He’s held residencies at Vitello’s Jazz and Supper Club from 2013-2016, Reed and Greenough from 2016-2020, Tosca Cafe from 2017-2019, The Den at the Four Seasons SF from 2017-2020, and has performed/recorded and/or toured with a variety of artists, including Gavin James, Sandra Bernhard, William Shatner, Richard Cheese, Jamison Ross, Scotty Barnhart, Roger Letson, Gabrielle Cavassa, Alphonso Horne, the Live Oaks, Mister Mellow, the Minnesota Child, Mike Olmos, Danny Brown amongst others.

In 2019 he began actively developing his side project St. Jimmy Joe, where he traveled throughout the US and Canada, playing an acoustic upright piano in National/State Parks, city streets and other nature-based settings.

As of 2022, he began a residency at the Lemon Squeeze in New Paltz, NY and from 2023-2025 he joined the faculty as a staff accompanist/collaborative pianist/adjunct instructor at SUNY - New Paltz.

He currently parks his van next to his greenhouse in a small town within the Hudson Valley region where he lives amongst family, friends and nature in an old converted barn.