Young Billy began after I found a book on Billy at the local library. I became fascinated with obscure facts about Billy...he loved to sing...he enjoyed theatrics...he came from a relatively well-to-do home and was considered smart in school; even the fact he went to school was a bit unusual for his place and time, the territory of New Mexico in the 1870's. It all seemed like great material for a musical. I realized quickly that a song I had written years before, "If I live to be 16", fit perfectly for Billy. I went through my mental catalog of songs looking for others and soon realized I would need to start writing songs to the story...a story I didn't yet know. Reading many books on Billy I realized this was not a simple story. It was 6 months before I could even start conceptualizing a plot for the "Book" of the musical. Over an initial period of one year I wrote most of the original 25-30 songs, and recorded them at home on a digital 8 track. While I was encouraged early on by close friends who heard the early versions I realized I needed someone who could expand and fulfill the musical sketches while keeping true to the feel of the work. After much on-line hunting and in-person meetings I was referred to Ed Goldfarb. After I sent Ed an MP3 of "Oh Billy" we got together in the spring of 2002 and began to plot taking the music of Young Billy to the next level.

On the next page are original early songwriter demos that were used as "roadmaps" for the produced demos on the music page.

The only known picture of

Billy the Kid.