About Us
The Inspiration
Brothers Rick and Tom Bray love local live music. They like to have a craft beer from time to time, too. Early one summer evening, they decided to go have a beer or two and find some live music. They drove to the first place, only to find an empty stage. They drove to another place... another empty stage, and that got them thinking out loud, "There's got to be a solution! Musicians want gigs. Venues have stages. We've got to find a way to fill these empty stages." And, so it began...
Our Team
Rick Bray
Co-Founder & Director of Technology
Rick loves live music. He developed Stages.Live to expand local live music ecosystems everywhere, and help artists and aspiring artists make a living doing what they love.
Stages.Live is the third technology startup founded by Rick. In his 20’s, he developed software for real estate closings and escrow accounting. When he sold the company, businesses in 18 states used his software.
His next innovation, the patented TVGuardian foul language filtering technology, was honored with a CES Best of Show Award and Innovations Awards for outstanding design and engineering. Rick served as CEO of this manufacturing and licensing company for 21 years. The TVGuardian technology was licensed into DVD Players, VCRs and Satellite TV, and its manufactured products were found on the shelves of major retailers.
Mike Seals
Executive Advisor
Mike’s professional career began at J. B. Hunt Transport Services in positions including SVP of Operations and President of J. B. Hunt Logistics, where he started 4 new divisions for the company.
After Hunt, Mike joined Rick and served as President of startup company Principle Solutions Inc built on Rick’s patented technology, TVGuardian. We were successful in manufacturing and selling hundreds of thousands of TVGuardian units to retailers such as Wal*Mart, Best Buy, Target, Family Christian Stores and others, and licensing the TVG technology into millions of TVG enabled DVD Players, VCRs and other products.
Mike served as Board Chairman and Volunteer Executive Director in 2020 & 2021. Mike ran for Mayor of Eureka Springs in 2018.
