Born in 1955, Paul grew up in New Jersey, ten miles from Manhattan. In 1978 he moved to the rolling hills of Pennsylvania. Paul had been self-employed beginning in 1973 at the early age of 17, and went on to spend more than 45 years restoring, buying and selling antique music machines, antique gambling machines, and classic jukeboxes.
After restoring more than 500 self-playing pianos, in addition to other mechanical collectibles, he retired in 2015. The author moved to Virginia in 2021 where he spends his days writing and creating music files from player piano music rolls.