Keyboard training is part of the core curriculum at US School
     
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Distance learning programs at US School of Commercial Music Learn guitar and bass at a professional level through a distance learning program at US School of Commercial Music.
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Some USSCM Students and Their Careers

      

Mari Leonel, Curitiba, Florianópolis, Brazil

Gerson Kornin, Curitiba, Florianópolis, Brazil

Dan Keller Bueren an der Aare, Switzerland

Will Vogtman, Maryland, United States

Dustin Shiozaki, Utah, United States

 
  Marilécia Leonel
(with Hermeto Pascoal)
Mari Leonel with Hermeto Pascoal
"USSCM provided a great opportunity
to develop a deeper understanding of music,
on a technical level and on a spiritual level.
I just have good things to say about the material.

The course is quite rigorous.
It provides the support and grounding
I needed to advance to another level
as a musician.

USSCM was the bridge that connected me
to a new stage in my career."

Location: Curitiba, Florianópolis, Brazil
Major: Performance
Principle instrument: Keyboard

CD: Manacá,
in collaboration with her husband, Gerson Kornin, and Hermeto Pascoal

Groups: Mari Leonel Trio, Mari Leonel Quartet

A resident of the State of Santa Catarina in Brazil, Mari Leonel came to US School after studying piano at Asbury College, Kentucky, and returning to Brazil to teach piano and perform classical and traditional Brazilian music.

She wanted to improve her understanding of musical concepts and develop her ability as an arranger and composer. She needed a school that would be affordable and would help her develop musically while allowing her to stay at home with a young family.

While Mari cites Miles Davis and Pat Metheny as influences, her own music is a fusion of American jazz, Brazilian popular music, and "my fascination with the inebriating rhythms created by the native people in their spontaneous involvement with nature."

She performs with the Mari Leonel Trio and the Mari Leonel Quartet. Her recent CD, "Manacá," is a collaboration with her husband, Gerson Kornin, and Hermeto Pascoal, the reigning wizard of Brazilian music considered by some to be the "the planet's greatest musician."

"The beauty of this land, of this forest sprinkled with the live colors of the Manacá trees, touched my soul once more. Poetry sprouted as rhythm, like the wooden clogs of our fandanguiros, striking hard on the wooden floor, echoing through the forests, the rivers, and the mangrove swamps in a celebration of life.

'Manacá' grew, became music, one more fruit of my partnership with Gerson . . . to nurture it further, I invited the magician who has lighted my musical journey and that of so many others, an inexhaustible source of inspiration: Hermeto Pascoal. Manaca flourished and flowed."

Some consider Hermeto Pascoal the world's most innovative and gifted composer alive. Yet his recent 60th birthday passed somewhat unnoticed in the US. Here's our little contribution to repair this oversight:

About Hermeto Pascoal:
Bruce Gilman says: "Hermeto Pascoal is the reigning wizard of Brazilian music who plays everything and anything. Piano, flute, sax, live pigs, you name it. He's the only one who can write a kick-ass samba in 3/4!"

His compositions have been recorded by Miles Davis, John McLaughlin, Duke Pearson, Gil Evans, Airto Moreira, Sivuca, and many others.