GROSSMONT COLLEGE — Hunched over the keys, eyes shut; Steve Baker plays some ragtime on  his vintage Aerosonic piano in his office in the Deanery of Grossmont College’s Modular Village.

Dean of the arts, language and communications programs, Baker has intensive training in the one thing that links the three areas together– communication– as well as in music performance and music theory.  He went to UCSD for his B.A., and to SDSUand Cal Poly San Luis Obispo for graduate school. , Baker is a college dean.   Some evenings and weekends, he’s in a different groove.

Passionate about his music, Baker still performs in shows, including the Grossmont faculty concert. He also helps with the Trolley Dances, in which members of the Jean Isaacs’ San Diego Dance Theater ride the San Diego Trolley to different stops, performing original choreography at the stations.   Married to the group’s founder, modern dancer Jean Isaacs,  Baker helps with sound re-enforcement, and recording or playing pieces of music as needed.

Baker maintains in his home a recording and mastering studio, where he is able to produce not only his own work but those of other artists.

Through his parents Gospel quartets, Baker came to the music at a very young age. He was particularly influenced by their piano player Bill Lee, who rocked. “He could have given Jerry Lee Lewis a run for his money” Baker said.  Inspired, Baker took piano lessons and traded in his bike for a guitar.  He knew having many music experiences was what he wanted to do.

What unifies his vocation and avocation? Always a musician at heart, Baker like to think of himself as a Muse,  coordinating the departments in his division, encouraging their performances, modeling what students will be doing throughout their careers, and refining methods of Communication.

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Sanchez is a student in Media Comm 132