Growing up in Montreal, Jonathan was the one child in the family that kept pursuing the Arts. His Father played classical guitar for years, as did one of his brothers and Jonathan’s interest in music began when he attempted to play the guitar, but gave it up to learn the drums instead. Coming home one day, banging on pots and pans with bamboo sticks, his Father eventually gave in and got him a drum to practice on. At the early age of 9, he began drum lessons. At the age of 12, his family moved to Ontario, and his Father eventually bought him a complete drum set to practice on. Like any child, Jonathan had already taken to drawing, and was only just beginning to understand his hands on creative ability. Jonathan’s instant passion for drumming and drawing have always been integral parts of his upbringing for as long as he can remember.

After attending Humber College’s renowned Jazz Program at the age of 19, Jonathan started playing drums in several original reggae bands in and around Toronto while pursuing various 9 to 5 jobs, dressed in suits and whatnot. Jonathan has been a musician and drummer now, for over 33 years, and was a founding member of “EQUALIZER”, a very successful 7 piece reggae band from Montreal. EQUALIZER played an original hybrid of Roots, Reggae and Rock, with inspirations from modern sounds of bands like Burning Spear, Steel Pulse, and The Police.

In 2000, the band released their much hyped debut album entitled, “Rise”, a collection of catchy hits from earlier chapters in the singer’s lives. When EQUALIZER disbanded in 2001, on the verge of a major record deal with Universal, and a steadily growing fan base, it was over the next 2 years that Jonathan formed his own dub reggae band, “the dub & the restless”.

After numerous successful shows around Montreal, the dub & the restless were invited to perform at the world renowned, Festival International de Jazz de Montreal in 2005 and again in 2008 to rave reviews and a massive crowd of over 10,000 spectators.

In between his music and art, Jonathan travelled to New York, Miami and Europe working as a model and actor, appearing in countless music videos and TV commercials, TV movies and feature films. Upon returning back home, moved back to Montreal and enrolled in an intensive one year program in Graphic Design. After graduation in 1994, he explored his options and moved back to Ontario equipped with only a pencil and a love for cartoons, to continue further education at Sheridan College’s world renowned Classical Animation program.

As a graduate from Sheridan College from 1997, Jonathan worked in the industry for 8 years, amongst several different Animation Studio’s. He worked as a Layout and Animation Posing Artist on the feature film, “Beavis & Butthead Do America”, and as an animator on a TV commercial for “Chips Ahoy Chocolate Chip Cookies”. He also worked as a Layout and Animation Posing Artist on a number of popular children’s TV cartoons including, “Fennec”, “The Adventures of Country Mouse and City Mouse”, “Caillou”, “Animal Crackers”, “Treasure”, “Flight Squad”, “My Goldfish is Evil!”, and the Emmy Award winning series “Arthur”, where Jonathan was honoured by the National Academy of Television Arts & Science for contributing to the Emmy Award winning program. He also worked on storyboard corrections on “Arthur”, and was also offered a job as a Storyboard Artist on Nickelodeon's "The Rugrats" in 1997, as well as a position working on "The Simpson's" in 1998, but turned them down in order to remain in Canada.

Jonathan still goes on auditions and has appeared in such feature films as “The Reagans”, “I Do But I Don’t”, Martin Scorcese’s “The Aviator”, “The Last Sign”, “Death Race”, "Polytechnique", “The Punisher 2 War Zone”, “Unstable”, and most recently, “Chloe” the new film by Atom Egoyan and appearances in the following Television Series: Being Erica, Flashpoint, The Bridge, The Border and US Attorney. Jonathan is also a Certified Personal Trainer.

In 2007 with renewed inspiration and self-assurance, while still in Montreal, Jonathan began teaching cartoon classes for children in many different Elementary Schools, working for "Sheltoons", and realized this was his true passion. Leaving his comfort zone in Montreal, along with many road blocks along the way, Jonathan moved back to Ontario in the summer of 2008. He has now started his own cartoon classes, to help inspire children to draw and create their very own cartoon characters, giving kids the creative outlet they need, to develop their own self-expression, self-esteem and self-confidence.

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