Music- the conveyance of one person's feelings or thoughts to others through the use of sound. Albeit, this is a wholly different definition of music than the usual strict, text book explanation of music as melody, harmony, and rhythm organized in a way that is pleasing to the ear, but one that is much more in keeping with the subjectivity of the art form: the fluidity of Charlie Parker vs. the angularity of Ornette Coleman, the structured beauty of Beethoven vs. the dense atonality of Schoenberg- who is to say which is valid and which is not. One man's noise is another man's music. To drummer Steve DeLuca, it is all music. Mixing it all up and seeing what happens is the aesthetic principle from which he likes to operate.
Growing up in Reading, PA, Steve had an early interest in music. Much of his youth was spent listening and "air-jamming" to Kiss, Aerosmith, Queen, and the archetypical Led Zeppelin. He started off playing piano at the age of five, but was always drawn to the drums. The incessant striking of an object is naturally appealing to a young boy and drummers always get the girls. He was to find that this last part is entirely untrue. Unless you sing or have a guitar, forget about sexual gratification.
Drums it was, but obstacles impeded Steve's eventual path. At the age of ten, his school band program told him that he did not have the aptitude for music and drums, but even at this young age, he reacted adversely to ostensible authority and began taking lessons. He did end up joining the school band and becoming the drummer for The Muhlenberg High School Spoilers, a jazz big band that received many awards in competition throughout the Northeast area, and Steve was the recipient of several awards, including one at the Brandywine Jazz Festival for Outstanding Musician of the Evening. It was also at this time that his musical interests expanded to include bands like The Mahavishnu Orchestra, The Tony Williams' Lifetime, and King Crimson.
After a brief and unsuccessful stint attempting to engross himself in classical percussion, Steve began to study jazz at Temple University in Philadelphia. Here his interest in fusion and progressive music was extrapolated to listening and studying artists such as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Thelonius Monk. His insatiable intake of music greatly expanded his musical palette and led Steve to the formation of a twofold theory. Firstly, it is vital that a musician have a deep historical well from which to draw upon and secondly, the musician should aspire to pour something back into that well.
After graduation, Steve became involved in the life of the cliched starving artist- getting through the banality of life by teaching, playing in cover bands, doing weddings and cocktail hours, and achieving artistic satisfaction by playing in two original bands, Eleventy Billion and Mahatma, that, while musically interesting, went unaccepted by an audience.
When Steve met Pamela, his wife, and moved to The Big Apple, it was the impetus and boon that led to Wooster Sang. He finally found his niche in a band that is not afraid of, indeed thrives on, their ability to encapsulate all their diverse influences and meld them into a sound that is distinctively their own. His playing in the band is imaginative, quirky, and with his "less is more" approach to equipment(he uses a four-piece set), he is able to relay an abundant amount of musical ideas utilizing various colors from minimal sources. Steve is looking forward to continuing his pursuit of combining the visceral and intellectual in drumming and leading Wooster Sang into an incredible future.