Michael Ludovici

I was born In Tucson Arizona in June of 1985. My mother was an elementary school teacher and my father was an artist and floor installer.  I also have an older brother who was born in November of 83'.

My father brought me up on a healthy  dose of music, art history, oil painting, and far too many movies..... I mean a whole lot of movies. Plus, MTV was really cool in the early nineties. Nirvana, Sound Garden, and Alice In Chains music videos played all day, and Beavis and Butthead episodes were broadcast all night. When I was seven my favorite pass time was to watch my father paint while we listened to Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, and The Doors ( good times.) I spent my elementary school years attending a private school. I ended up choosing to spend my fifth grade year at a public school after vowing to never practice any form of organized religion. (I left private school a little angry at Catholicism.)

After the initial culture shock of middle school, I realized I was a bit of a nerd, and I felt a little self conscious at that point in time. I had a few run-ins with bully types. I spent a lot of time writing in composition notebooks about feeling out of place and alienated. Perhaps I was a bit too introverted as a kid, but at least I had some honest questions on my mind about my life path and what it means to be alive in general. Good books and music were always a kind of haven for me while growing up.

When I was thirteen, I bought a cheap Fender Squire at the local guitar shop. I would hang out with some friends and try to figure out Nirvana songs by ear. We were pretty atrocious but we made steady progress and had a lot of fun doing it. This one day in the eighth grade I was sitting under a tree with my friends when I noticed some new faces among the group. One seventh grader in particular stood out. He had long dirty blond ( brownish ) hair and deep blue eyes. There was something undeniably familiar about his presence. We struck up a conversation, his name was Randall Swindell and before I knew it he was asking me if I knew how to play the drums(?) I said something silly like “I can learn.” The two of us spent a lot of time in the old jam room at his place from that day on. We also had a lot in common as far as wanting to somehow convey to each other our shared interests in visual arts, music, and even elevated or higher states of consciousness, where we realized our spirits were kindred.

I was always very interested in the world of music in general, but I never really felt like I had the ability, nor the right to participate in the medium of music as an artist. When Randall started teaching me how to play his five piece drum kit, he was shining light on a path I had not realized was accessible to me. Together we learned about trust, respect, and pooling resources.

Randall and myself started exploring the various aspects of music when we were thirteen and fourteen years old, and we are still doing it today with some of the most beautiful and intelligent people we will ever be blessed to know.  As a group, Ensphere continues to work hard and to learn what it can within the confines of creative expression. Our work has expanded into self and collective development through various mediums of performance art. We seek a direct exchange with that which is valuable and fulfilling in the human experience, and hope by doing so, that we will live illuminated as well, and hope to always attain a higher sense of understanding.

  With love and service,

Michael Ludovici