Tutor in Brooklyn, NY 11222

I teach music theory, composition, and guitar in the styles of jazz, blues, bossa nova, samba, rock, metal as well as portuguese and english as a second language. I can conduct music lessons in Spanish, English, and Portuguese. I was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil as the son of an American father and Brazilian mother. From the age of 10 until I graduated high school I volunteered at local "favelas" teaching english and music.

My introduction to the arts began at a very young age. My mother is a classically trained ballerina who comes from an extremely artistic background of piano players, opera singers, poets and actors. I began playing the electric guitar when I was seven, around the same time my brother began playing the drums, and have been in love with the same instrument since the first time I picked it up. I started off playing metal, which I never abandoned, but developed to learn many different musical languages. In 2008 I moved to America to study at Bard College, where I would receive my BA in music performance and composition. During the spring semester of my junior year I went abroad to Havana, Cuba, where I studied Cuban percussion and guitar seven days a week. There, I performed around the local jazz scene with great musicians such as Michel Herrera (Wynton Marsalis) and Orlando Sanchez (Chucho Valdes) and gave guitar lessons to students from the University of Havana. Upon my return I played with Erica Lindsay (Mccoy Tyner, Frank Zappa, Art Blakey) and had one of my pieces premiered by the Da Capo Chamber Players in NYC. I currently teach students from the age of 2 onward at "Learn To Rock" and in my studio in Williamsburg, where I have guitars, amplifiers, a piano and a full drum kit.

My job is to help the students cultivate their innate, musical understanding through the academic and empirical knowledge I have acquired. Everybody is an artist; the mentor should merely direct the student to unveil his or her natural talent.