Artist Biographies
Get to know the musical backgrounds and perspectives of our artists.
🎼🎵🎶🎵🎶🎵𝄇 𝄢🎵🎶🎵🎶🎵𝄇
🎵 Aural Explorer Portal — Celestial Symphonic Spheres 🎷
Second Movement — Motif Α:
The Outer Planets of the Solar System, andante
🌎 Unveil the carousel of celestial spheres… 🌖
[Tip for mobile viewers: expand and collapse one of the images to start carousel rotation]
🌟🎼🎵♩🎶 𝄇 The following musical selections are recommended for your listening enjoyment:
☀️ Holst: The Planets, Op. 32: VI. Uranus, the Magician
☀️ Holst: The Planets, Op. 32: VII. Neptune, the Mystic
The foregoing selections are from the The Planets (album) by Gustav Holst, performed by the Berliner Philharmoniker
conducted by Herbert von Karajan, 1981
𝄢🎵🎶🎵🎶🎵𝄇 🎼🎵🎶🎵🎶🎵𝄇
🪐 William K Meessen, (1953 – )
Chief Sacred Music Composer — alongside fulfillment of rhythm guitarist and lead and harmony vocalist roles; founder of the Synestial Music of the Spheres publisher, members of ASCAP; (surname pronounced “Mason” — think Beethoven)
The Early Years and Living Abroad
I grew up in the era when rock and roll was reaching its full stride in the 1960s and 1970s, and launched into a long and complicated relationship with the guitar that continues to this day. This included playing in garage and jam bands for the pure delight of music-making. During my college year abroad, I grew more serious about guitar and less so about my studies, leading me to quit school and try my hand at a musical instrument factory in southern Germany. I soon understood that this was not to be my chosen vocation, and then returned to the U.S., eventually to pursue a career in Information Technology with a major aerospace firm.
Secular Jamming and Sacred Roots
As my music-making continued — both solo and with jamming buddies — I began to compose both sacred and secular works, the latter being manifested in the “joyful strains” of The Elsewhen Guardinias and The Mystic Weasels, featured here. With respect to the sacred side, my musical journey up through the present day has culminated in the 2025 release of my first album, “We Have Wakened in Thy Shelter”. The nine songs on this album are sacred texts (prayers) of the Bahá’í Faith set to my musical compositions, and feature my solo work throughout (playing all instruments and performing all vocals).
Retirement, Learning and Recording
Retirement has allowed me the opportunity to learn audio engineering fundamentals and to indulge my passion for the dulcet tones of calmer (!) harmonious music alongside the energetic strains of rock, jazz, blues, folk…and all of the genres that inspire music-lovers the world over.
I and my musician friends in this community have not made our living in music. Still, we are passionate about our avocation, and it is my fervent hope that our music will resonate with you in one way or another, and we invite your communication with us as you see fit.
As I like to say, “Blessed be the listener!”
🧙🏻♂️ Edward T Osenbaugh, (1955 – )
Jammin’ Wizard — alongside fulfillment of rhythm guitarist and lead and harmony vocalist roles; founder of the Elsewhen community in the U.S. Midwest
Pending
[awaiting clearance from the authorities]
Pending
[subject to indemnification]
Pending
[possible quantum leap]
🎸 James S (“JJ”) Jackson, (195_ – )
Chief Lead Guitarist — alongside fulfillment of rhythm guitarist roles; in addition to Mystic Weaselhood, member of two other bands (Joy Ride and Perry Mason 2 T.W.S.S.)
Pending
[rock]
Pending
[and]
Pending
[roll]
✍️ George A Pal, (1950 – 2017) [bio ghost-written by JJ and WKM]
Chief Secular Lyricist — alongside fulfillment of rhythm guitarist and lead and harmony vocalist roles; songwriter for many Mystic Weasels tunes
The Early Years and Living Abroad
George grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, which, of course, is home to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. It had not yet been established (that being years later in 1983) when George was privileged to see (rather than hear, due to all the young girls screaming) The Beatles (live!) in the late 1960s.
Many moons thereafter, by the time he had reached draft age, it became unavoidable for him to pay his debt of service to Uncle Sam, and so the U.S. Army shipped him to (West) Germany to serve as a Military Policeman. During his off-duty hours, he and his fellow conscripts dove deeply into the music of the times, forming a long-term bond with this rebellious and spirited music of his youth.
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“Go West, Young Man!”
After an honorable military discharge, his return to the staid, conservative and “square” Midwest did not sit well, thus eliciting in him a profound drive to clear his head and move as far away from it as possible — to the westernmost point of the continental United States, which is the Pacific coast of Washington state. It just so happened that a small number of like-minded free spirits had similar motivations and had set up encampments fashioned out of driftwood and whatever flotsam and jetsam was brought in by the tide. Some might call them “squatters”, but these back-to-nature souls had tapped inextricably into the primeval vibrations of a pristine and ineffably beautiful place called Shi Shi (“Magic Magic”) Beach (in the local Makah Indian language). It was here that George had graciously shared the wealth of his treasured discovery — concurrently inculcating in us an inescapable love of the natural rhythms of sun, sky and surf.
Poetry in Motion
Through some inscrutable alchemical process, we resolved to transmute those harmonious natural resonances into emotive rarefactions of the air, known collectively as “music” (!), specifically under the nurturing aegis of The Mystic Weasels — our rock (and soul?!) band for the ages. Despite a sometimes gruff exterior, George had a proclivity for love songs — replete with tender sentiments, no less — and found his calling as our chief lyricist.
Many of the tunes on our (someday!) forthcoming Weasels album, Imagining the Synestia, will feature his writing, and we are proud to honor his legacy in this way. Sadly, Parkinson’s disease proved to be a mountain too high to climb for George, and he left us for the Great Beyond in 2017.
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🎹 Scott L Strait, (1955 – 2015) [bio ghost-written by ETO and WKM]
Chief Guitar Synthesist — alongside fulfillment of rhythm guitarist and lead and harmony vocalist roles; songwriter for many Elsewhen Guardinias tunes
The Early Years: Close to the Land
Scott was raised in Iowa corn country, and his authentic Midwestern values of honor, goodness and truthfulness were always manifest in his very being. He and Ed became fast friends and bandmates early in their itinerant musical wanderings (and, fortunately for us, they both wandered out west to Washington state).
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“Get Married and Have Kids!”
Scott’s journey to the Pacific Northwest was preordained, perhaps — and the same could be said for his marriage to Buffy (Beth, a pianist) and the rearing of their two children, Heather and Julian. It was in that familial context that the music of The Elsewhen Guardinias would find expression now and again, as well as making the Give It To Me Strait recordings in the living rooms of our various homes throughout the years.
Poetry in Repose
Besides writing songs, he also crafted intriguing poems that invited the reader into contemplative spiritual postures in something of a closely-held “conversation of souls.” We hope to do those works justice by publishing his book of poetry in this century. Due to serious challenges with heart disease, he left us way too early for the Great Beyond in 2015.
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