I am not what you think

I am not supposed to be a musician.

As a matter of fact I was trained in marketing, business, languages and trade before I had formal musical education, furthermore I did years of logistics and international trade before jumping into my main goal at the time: becoming what I call the “ideal sideman” in music.

Now, truth be told and modesty aside I can direct, conduct, arrange and lead combos and musical ensembles of various styles and formats while I take pride in being like the tires of a car: No one talks about them however they make things move forward…that process though was quite the ride and is still an endless journey.

When I was young I finished Business School and what’s equivalent to a minor in Marketing so I did what would have been expected: I got a job in an office working in front of a computer for hours and hours, I had a pretty good income for a freshly graduated professional if you ask me but the day came for me to question myself and ask whether that was what I wanted.

The answer was NO and being 24 at the time I had to make a decision before “it was too late” (insert your favorite dramatic music). Now, while I was and still am incredibly thankful to life, my parents (for the provided education) and my bosses and friends at DGF (which is where I worked at the time, kudos to Jack and Nelly)who had my back and supported me in my brief career there I finally made my decision on a night of December 2013: Walked to my boss’s office and presented my notice of leave.

If you’ve read until this point chances are you may have guessed I left a steady good job to pursue my goal of becoming a musician and live happily ever after. To be quite frank there are many more nuances to it as the following years were quite the struggle: self teaching music, sending applications to various music schools and being rejected over and over again and basically spending all my savings in musical equipment, lessons and efforts to get a chance to be admitted in a music education institution (those who perform arts may understand that being 25 at the time things started to fall into place meant I was quite “old” for some schools standards).

Anyway, rejection after rejection and after a year and a half of consistent applications sent to different schools I had the privilege to be admitted in the professional course of the Senior Music School of the National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature in the course of Bass specialized in Jazz execution.

Now was the time to make things happen…