Biography

 Born in Chicago and raised in Southern California, Cej took up the classical violin at age 6. At age 11 he abandoned the violin for the guitar, teaching himself by playing along to Woody Guthrie's songs, as recorded by Rambling Jack Elliott, Cisco Houston and Woody himself (the famous sessions with Woody, Cisco Houston, Leadbelly and Sonny Terry). Cej wrote his first song, Let 'em Be The Last, when he was 16, on the evening of Bobbie Kennedy's assassination in 1968. Decades later it was included on his first CD, Sleepwalker In Paradise.

Seduced by the Paul Butterfield Blues band, and the electric blues flowing out of the South Side of Chicago, Cej picked up the electric guitar in his teens. After a short run at college as a music major, he dropped out and joined a rock 'n' roll band. Twelve years, three bands and three eponymous albums later (Sweet Pain, United Artists Records, 1970;  Rock Rose, CBS/Sony, 1979; and Small talk, MCA, 1981), he became disillusioned with the music business and "dropped out" again, this time to return to school.

Armed with a masters degree in social work, he launched a new career in the mental health field. Simultaneously, he and home town friend, Joel Rafael, started playing coffee houses together.  This bloomed into the Joel Rafael Band...a ten year run (1994-2004)...recording 5 Cd's, including two Woody Guthrie collections. While with the Joel Rafael Band, Cej also got to share the stage with many of his folk music heroes,  at a number of major Music Festivals: Joan Baez, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Odetta, John Prine, Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seeger, to mention a few.

Post Joel Rafael Band, Cej began to work as a traveling mental health consultant: an itinerant  social working providing novel counseling services to military families throughout the US, Europe, Asia and Africa...collecting experiences and writing songs along the way.  During this time he was able to record and release CDs when he was home. However, his long assignments kept him away from home for long periods of time, making live touring virtually impossible, although he was a two-time featured artist at the FarWest Folk Alliance Conference during this time.

His first CD, Sleepwalker In Paradise, was released in 2013. It landed on the Folk-DJ Top Albums list for 2014, with additional airplay on 75 AAA,  Americana, College and Community Radio stations in the US, Canada, Europe, Australia and Israel. His next two CDs, Clovis Man (2017) and Adobe Road (2019) significantly expanded his radio presence.  His newest CD, Friend Of The Sky (2020)  climbed to #2 on the 2021 Roots Music Report Chart in the Alternative  Folk category, a new high mark for a Cej CD.

Cej performs solo, capturing the energy and spirit of his recordings in his  live performances.