Tom is from Minnesota, played bass in orchestra through college, studied jazz and blues in Chicago. He played the Chicago Jazz festival with world renown blues and boogie pianist Pigmeat Jarret. He has been a long time member of the Cincinnati Dancing Pigs and is in the International Jugband Hall of Fame. Him and Eric Evans have been playing music together for two decades including a fifteen year Happy Hour run at Arnold's Bar and Grill in downtown Cincinnati and in bands such as Cadillac and Catfish, The Dancing Pigs and the Cincinnati Hot Six. Tom plays a 100 year old German upright bass.