So, let’s say you’re a musician. You’re passionate about what you play, how you play, why you play, and how it makes you feel when you play your music. Let’s also say that you recorded and released some of your music, and it was actually selling! The feeling of validation and accomplishment must be overwhelming, endorphins surging — this is exactly what you hoped for when you first picked up your instrument(s).
The money wouldn’t be terrible to have either.
However, if your name just happens to be the exact same as a very popular social media figure and model in Brazil, this can cause a snag in the automatic depositing of royalties into your account. No one knows this scenario better than Lucas Andrade.
But more on that later.
“I’ve been a musician ever since I was 12 or 13 years old living in Teresópolis, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,” says Lucas. “For the first four years of my musical life, I was a self-taught drummer first, then I migrated over to guitar.” While Lucas had a finely tuned ear for pitch, chords, and rhythm, he began to feel that maybe a more formal education could benefit his hopeful career as a musician.
While still in high school he received a full scholarship to a music conservatory, where he received the “other half” of his music training. While his innate gift for music was something he appreciated and never took for granted, he felt understanding music theory would probably be a good thing to have under his belt.
He also discovered — quite by accident — that he had a knack for teaching. “There were times when I’d be playing guitar, and someone would always approach me to find out what particular chords I was playing.” While a lot of musicians might bristle at the thought of “sharing the mystery of music,” Lucas jumped at every opportunity to share whatever musical knowledge he could impart. It was at this point when he decided to take his music training even further, and head off to college (UNIMES — Universidade Metropolitana de Santos) where he ultimately graduated with a degree in music education.
Not that he needed any additional sign or encouragement to know that music as a career was his destiny, but while attending UNIMES, he was contacted by the pastor at Alliance Community Church in Oak Bluffs about leaving Brazil and becoming the music director for their congregation. While that’s not exactly the way Lucas described it, that’s pretty much what it amounted to: “I told the pastor that I was still attending university, and couldn’t really consider the offer until I completed my studies. Thankfully, he was more than willing to wait, and the offer would still be there once I graduated. They even helped me with my immigration paperwork.” He arrived on the Vineyard in 2018.
Now, with more than 10 years of experience, Lucas has truly fortified his musical résumé by not only teaching folks to play music through his private music school when he lived in Brazil, but now on the Vineyard. He’s also been molding the musical minds of tomorrow over at the Edgartown School as the music teacher since October of last year.
When you speak with Lucas, you get this sense of solemness from him — a sort of spirituality — for his chosen discipline. I hesitate to call it a “mission from God” à la “The Blues Brothers.” But he just emanates pure joy when he talks about teaching kids — either at the Edgartown School or privately.
“The kids need to have fun, they need to be engaged in the process of making music by having them play what they know and enjoy,” Ostinato says.“The kids are now learning how to play guitar and ukulele by playing songs they know and appreciate.”
When it comes to his own music, you can get an understanding of his sensibilities by heading over to his website, lucasostinato.com.
One of the first videos you will see is Lucas, along with his wife, Jennyfer, performing their version of “My Favorite Things.” You can just imagine them playing this for their 9-month-old daughter, Lauren, to get her off to sleep. But don’t stop there.
Keep exploring these very well-put-together videos, and stop on Lucas and Josh Levine tearing up “Feira de Mangaio.” It’s with this particular tune that you see Lucas’ virtuosity on several instruments.
If you ever have the opportunity to see the Lucas Ostinato Trio play live, you’ll be feted to not only a wonderful mixture of traditional Brazilian music and jazz, but the ability of its members to switch instruments during their sets. It’s not that they’re showing off proficiency or anything, they’re keeping themselves interested in the music, and hopefully keeping us engaged at the same time.
As we talked, I wanted to get a sense of his philosophy when it comes to his music. Does he believe innate musicianship trumps formal music education? Not at all.
“When you write a song from intuition, that’s when it comes from an honest place,” he says. “But when you add your knowledge of music theory, you have a tendency to think too much. You have to be really careful to put your honesty into your music. Because as important as formal music education can be, it can contradict soul-inspired inspiration,” says Lucas. “I’m always trying to be as honest as I can with my music. I’m a simple guy that takes music seriously.”
Now, back to the conundrum from the beginning of this article.
So, Lucas distributed and sold some of his music in Brazil under his given name, Lucas Andrade. Little did he realize that there was some popular guy who is big on TikTok and other social media platforms who shared the same name. Just by virtue of the way the system of sales is set up, all the proceeds from Lucas’ music sales went to the “other Lucas.” Though it just doesn’t seem plausible, that’s how it all went down. So our Lucas — unable to recover any of the money that was rightfully his — changed his name to Ostinato to avoid any similar financial confusion in the future.
So, word to the wise — especially if you’re a musician: Enjoy your craft, enjoy the process, but make sure your intellectual property benefits you and no one else.
Check out Lucas’ YouTube channel at youtube.com/@lucasostinato3548.
