Letieres Leite

Paintings, instruments, music. Art has always been the expression motor of Letieres Leite. He was only 13 when he joined the Afro-Brazilian Orchestra of Severino Vieria High School in Salvador. That marked the beginning of his academic activities. Back then, the Orchestra was conducted by the ethnomusicologist Emilia Biancardi. Later he studied at the School of Fine Arts of the Federal University of Bahia (UFBA). In parallel, he taught himself to read and play the flute and sax and in 1986, he joined the Franz Schubert Conservatory in Vienna, Austria.

(December 8, 1959 – October 27, 2021) Born and educated in Bahia, Northern Brazil, Letieres moved to Europe in 1986 where he lived for 10 years and started out as a professional musician. There he played with various musicians in festivals across the continent, including Gil Goldstein in 1990, Paulo Moura at the Montreux Jazz Festival and Jazz Zurich in 1992, and Alfredo de la Fé in the European tour in 1993. He also worked with the Hip-Noses (Herbie Kopf) and Tamanduá, both groups were formed by Brazilians and Europeans.

Unlike many musicians who find success abroad, in 1994 Letieres returned to Salvador and founded the Bahia Music Academy (AMBAH) at the Centre for the Arts Education (Centro de Formação em Artes) in Salvador. Currently, he is the music and educational director of both Rumpilezzinho, a project that develops new young talent, and Rumpilezz de Saia, solely dedicated to the training of instrumentalist women. He also coordinates the Course for the Qualification in Music from the Cultural Foundation of the State of Bahia (FUNCEB).

All the projects that Letieres are involved in aims to establish a system to share knowledge between the musicians, the public, and the educational institutions. They are all grounded in the enhancement and diffusion of Bahian black music history, which is the reason of Letieres’ work and dedication. Orkestra Rumpilezz is the main conveyor of his ideas as a composer, music director and musician. Although he has his roots in Salvador, his branches are flowing over the contemporaneity of the universal creations.