Author: Weverton Santos

Moving to another country: a wonderful and outstanding life experience? The truth about this process is totally different. Of course there are good things and fantastic experiences, but there also hard challenges we need to manage day by day.

My first day in the USA was not as glamorous as many people imagine 🤣 it was crazy! I had 4 flights before arriving in Rochester. When I got here on Thursday, 8/25/2022 I was without some important stuff such as pillow, clothes hanger, power plug extension, sheet, duvet, and many other “simple” and necessary things that we never remember until we need them.

My Brazilian friend Érico met me at the airport, introduced me to the city and led me to Walmart to buy necessary items to complement my bedroom stuff. He helped a lot, guiding me around the place and showing me products unknown to me. It was a long and exhausting shopping day, but I bought all necessary items.
The first week was very, very stressful and tiring! I had many orientation meetings and sometimes I could not understand everything clearly, but I could make it up later. (I’ll write more about this later.)

But Weverton, you ask, what about the good things?!
Well, before Walmart Érico showed me some places in the city. Then I became aware of the wonderful things presented to me. The good energy around the city, the animals, beautiful landscapes, different people from my own culture… all amazing, the neighbourhood is calm (except the musician’s houses, very noisy all day 😆), people’s whispers are different and many other things. The atmosphere is completely different from my country! I realized that I am a new person in this new atmosphere. I started out being “afraid” about these differences, and I said to myself “ Don’t freak out Weverton! It’s just different, not just more of the same”.  I then understood why the composer Dvořák wrote the New World Symphony when he spent some time in the USA, because the cultural differences wake up a feeling inside ourselves to learn and share more and more.
Of course I will have challenges here, it’s a new world! But, new challenges come with more knowledge and maturity to handle each one and the good things are like the last movement of the Dvořák Symphony, grandiose and transforming!

And you, what is your new world? This is mine!

Hello everyone! My name is Weverton, but everybody calls me by my nickname Grilo, cricket in English (from Jiminy Cricket). Now, I would like to introduce myself before writing about my life studying at Eastman. Let’s go!

I began studying french horn at the age of 11 in my hown town Sarzedo, near Belo Horizonte, state capital of Minas Gerais, Brazil.

My first teacher was the conductor and trumpetist Joanir de Oliveira, leader of the municipal Music Project; he said I should play the horn and he guided me through the first steps. My undergraduate degree was at UEMG, the Minas Gerais State University’s Music School, where I studied french horn with Sarah Ramez and Sérgio Gomes. There I had many opportunities to play and meet other musicians.

One of these opportunities was playing in Germany with the Orquestra Minas Barroca. It was an incredible experience that showed me how huge the music world is, giving me another perspective and references to improve my musical skills. This trip helped me to improve not just my horn and musical skills, but also my musical maturity, giving me another vision of the world.

After graduation I was invited by my teacher Sérgio Gomes to join the Minas Gerais Symphony Orchestra as a guest musician. Playing there was one of my most important profissional experiences. I learned a lot about the life of a professional musician and how should I behave profissionally. A few years later I became a horn teacher at the Sarzedo Music Project, where I studied as a child. It was a great opportunity and made me happy to contribute to the same project that aided me all these years ago.

I was also selected for the Orchestra of the Americas Mexican tour. This experience changed everything for me, it was a watershed in my life. I compared experiences with many people of other cultures, giving me a world vision of everything I could learn and share. A few months after that, I was selected for a chamber music festival in Chile, and of course that also was perfect!

After these opportunities abroad, I felt the necessity to study outside my country to know and learn more. At the Academy of the Minas Gerais Philarmonic Orchestra I studied under Alma Maria Liebrecht and asked her to help me prepare for this goal. She showed me another point of view to play horn, helping me to improve to my musicality in a different and effective way. In this way she prepared me for my entry into the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, as a graduate student.

More about that soon!