01- Hello Andre, how are you? Thanks a lot for the opportunity! Please starting by telling us your beggining with music and who are your heroes of the instrument!

I’m the one to thank you for the invitation!
My beginning happened naturally because my father and my uncles used to play choro in my grandmother’s house at the weekends, there was also the band of my older cousins, a Orquestra Azul, which unbeliable used to play covers from Mahavisnhu Orchestra by John Mclauglin,in Brazil in 1978!!! My cousin had a Gibson SG of two necks and I used to stare it for hours, kind of hypnotized!
So I started playing acoustic guitar, but the taste for Rock n’ roll came up with the desire of playing the guitar, in that time I was 11 and I started having some classes in the schools close to my home.
I’ve a lot of different heroes for different times of my life.At the beginning they were:Angus Young, Brian May, Randy Rhoads, Eddie Van Halen among others, The two last ones are my heroes up to date!! After the Blues and Jazz,
so Robben Ford, Scott Henderson, Pat Metheny, and of course I had Shred Guitar phase with  Yngwie Malmsteen, Greg Howe, Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Vinnie Moore  among others.

 

02- Who were your teachers of instruments and music?

I had lots o different teacher, after all, I took lessons of harmony, arrangement, I studied classical acoustic guitar, bass, but I gotta stand out three master of guitar which were the most important: The guitarist Michel Perie which was my first great teacher, in that time he had just arrivded from GIT in Los Angeles and brought a whole new material full of licks, transcriptions which were impossible to find here in Brazil by that time, around 1985. He was the first guy to introduce me to the concepts of modes, harmony, improvising and etc.
After I studied with Mozart Mello, who doesn’t need introductions, I was his student for like 5 years, it was the very same time when I had to make a decision about becoming a professional musician and he influenced me in a very positive way. I don’t know if he knows about it!!! He’s one of the most smart, charismatic and honest people I ever met. If you have the chance to live with him, you’ll notice how much he enjoys what he does and how it makes him happy regardless what it gives you back. It was pretty important for me to keep playing and he was also the responsible for making me enjoy styles like jazz, blues, latin-jazz, brazillian instrumental music and etc.
I’ve had some classes with Alexandre Birket recently, a jazz master and brazilian music master which lives in Santos, he opened my mind to a lot of different things with a very cool didactic taken from his experience. He is a very experienced guy in the this subject, to make it clearer he was the guy chosen for the Robertinho silva to record his albums, besides being an amazing person.

03- You made a decision about not going to the music college, what was the reason of that decision?

In that time I had to make this choice between going to the college or keep my guitar studies. I was already a teacher and some of my students, like for example Rafael, which went to college and I could notice that they didn’t have enough time to study what I asked them to, and they had so much homework due to the college. It was pretty important in my choice because I really wanted to develop as an instrumentist so I thought it would be better to not share any time with other activities even being the musical area. Of course that going that way I lost a lot of other knowledgements , but the good part was that I could play guitar for nine hours a day, and that was period which I achieved the technique to which has been pretty useful up to date.

 

04- You were a member of Angra in the very beginning. What made you to leave the band? How was to deal with all that looking what the band has achieved?

I’ve often answered that question , even more now which I am playing with André Matos again. What people need to understand is that it’s perfectly possible to make a living and be happy playing guitar without being a rock star, metal star or whatever.  In that moment I was in the highlight of my studies with Mozart Mello discovering a whole new universe and full of things to study and playing the guitar. So the idea of working too hard on a heavy metal band didn’t get me inspired even knowing that band would reach a success once it was lead by the ex-viper singer, band which had already achieved recognition in Europe and Japan. Without mentioning that Angra even in the first rehearsals seemed to be a different and quality band. I was there because people told me it was a great opportunity, not because I wanted to, except for Luis which took me to the band, I had just meet them, I couldn’t focus on it as much as that project needed. All these things took all the members to be disappointed and it was much reasonable to leave the place to someone who could see there a great professional opportunity.  Then I decided to focus more on the instrumental music and my studies, Kiko replaced me, Rafael became my student and I used to attend the concerts when I could, I even played a song with them in Curitiba!! Of course it was a tough decision to give up a so promissory project, but this is the kind of choice you just can do when you are young, so I did!!!

05- How is your teacher work?

Teaching is one of the things which I enjoy the most, for me is like an essential part of all the musical and artistic side I develop. I have been doing this for 20 year and I intend to keep it, even with tours I always find someway to fit some classes during it. Besides that, for a long period of my life, it was my main source of money to support my family. Because of that, teaching for me is a very serious thing and I’ve been trying to improve during this 20 years. I also believe in the responsibility of this profession as well as any kind of educator. Unfortanelly, there’re lot of people not prepared to teach taking money from innocent people which can’t realize this. There should be a professional organ to take care of it! I hate when someone comes to me and say “I’m a professional musician, I play and I teach to get some money”, what is it?? So leave it for the ones who like it and know how to do that!! 

06-How is to make a living by music in Brazil?

Making a living in Brazil is difficult for everyone who does something linked to art. By the way, I have seen this in all over the world, since we are living in the age of globalization.
In Brazil we still have the fact of having a third world economy, managed by politicians who we call corrupted would be kind of compliment. We just can’t blame on them, because the biggest part of the population is much concerned in who is going to be on Big Brother than the real news from the national journalistic shows in the most important hours of our television.
So here is my advice: Making a live by music should be exclusively by love and work hard to get at least the minimum situation for you and you family without depending on the “help” of our government, because if we do, we are screwed up!

07- You have your instrumental project which is focused on the rock/fusion. How do you see the market for this genre of music? What are your influences in that style?

Well, the market is not good even for pop bands, so try to imagine for fusion!!! But if you do instrumental musical in Brazil expecting something from the market you will get disappointed. Do for your personal desire. And you’ll end up by getting students, support from some companies besides a small fan base, it’s worthy!
My influences are everything I listened to and studied during all these years.
I think it’s a little pretentious to talk that my influences are those guys who I admire, I wish!!

08- How does work the process of writing for this style?

During the process you can feel disappointed because the greatest guys in that genre are really incredible talented and really know about electric guitar. So everytime I finish a song I got the conclusion that I need to do a bigger effort next time, because they are years of experience ahead me, but this is the challenge!! That’s the thing which makes me wake up everyday!!! It’s not that different of writing any other kind of music, in other words, it also counts that saying: “music is 10% inspiring and 90% transpiring”.

 

09-In the year of 2006 you joined André Matos’ band, how did the invitation come up?

It was fun because some weeks before the invitation comes up I was talking to my wife and I mentioned that this life of instrumental musician and teacher was starting to become too “correct” and a little of fun and noise would be great! So I was at home and Hugo gave me call telling that André was forming a solo band and he was looking for an other guitarist. He invited me to record the solos of a demo and after a few days the official invitation come, I accepted in the same moment! After all back in day I did a choice which gave me the opportunity to live the most different situations a musician can live, but with that choice I wasn’t able to be in a band with friend traveling around the world, and now I’m having that chance again. So I feel very blessed!!

10- What is this experience like?     

Fun, although it is a great responsible. After all, André is worldly recognized as one of the biggest icons of this style, I could see this during the international trips we’ve done. It’s has also been a great musical experience, because I didn’t totally got away from Heavy-metal since I had a lot of students from that style which I recorded to and produced some of their bands, but the stage presence was lost in the past!
So I need to research and get ready to face the difference of posture, mixing, tone at stage. Things that they had already done for such a long time.

11- What is to be a fusion guitar player in a Heavy metal band like?

To be a fusion guitar player was a choice based on my wish and for professional reasons, what I mean is that to make a living by music I needed to become a guitar player of all styles you can imagine. So, going back to heavy metal was just a challenge which I needed to face in my musician life, challenge which took hours of research and dedication like all the other ones, the difference was that there was much more pleasure involved, making it much easier!
Technically there wasn’t huge problems, I just need sometime to get update and that way help on the songwriting parts, which I could during the production of the second album which is almost done.

12- Talking about your equipment, which equipment do you use live and who are your sponsors?

When I’m playing on André Matos’ band I use the distortion of my amplifier which is a Rotstage CJ100 added to a Dual Driver pedal by Nig, so for the solos I add a digidelay by Digitech and an amp simulator by Nig to “boost” my volume.  All my guitars are built by a luthier named Castelli, the ones I use on the band have the neck connected to the body and it’s scalloped from the 12 fret. The AH-02red is equipped with an EMG 81 and 89 and in the AH-02 Blackburst there’s a Seymour Duncan Blackout also an active pickup. The strings are the ones by Nig, I use the 0.12 gauge on the lower strings and 0.10 in the higher ones to record and I used to go for the 0.10 set live, but I tried the 0.11 on the lower strings during the last tour and I really liked it. When it comes about the fusion part, I just change the Dual Drive pedal for the Shred Pro also built by Nig, and I plug this into the clean channel of the Rotstage amplifier, that way I get a “thinner” tone, clean and defined, which we need for a jazz/fusion phrasing. In some occasions I add a compressor and chorus pedal in a slightly level when I’m using a clean sound.
My sponsors and partners, who I would like to take this opportunity to thank are: Nig string and pedal, Rotstage amplifiers, Castelli guitars and Digitech effects.

13- Thanks a lot for the interview, please leave a message to our viewers.

I want to thank the opportunity of talking to the viewers of Guitar Clinic, and to say that despite the hard times we can face for being a guitar player in the country of carnival, don’t give up, study and get ready to become great professionals, because that way it will be possible to make a living and feel yourself accomplished. After all, it’s very important to wake up on a Monday knowing that you are about to do what you enjoy the most, getting paid honestly and feeling great by the night. Follow my tips! It’s worthy!
A great Hug!