After graduating from the Eastman School of Music in 2009 with a BM in saxophone performance and music education, Mike joined Teach for America and worked as a Kindergarten / 1st grade classroom teacher for the following decade. For the last five years he has been adjunct woodwind faculty at the Francis W. Parker School in Lincoln Park, a teaching artist with the Ravinia Festival, and is hired to play flute, piccolo, oboe, English Horn, clarinet(s), saxophone(s), and bassoon as a pit orchestra musician for theaters throughout Chicagoland. He is grateful for his husband Johnny – his biggest fan!