Today we’d like to introduce you to Melody Alvarado.
Melody, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
When I say we have to start at the very beginning, I really mean the VERY beginning. I was born near Chicago, and though you normally hear of a baby crying as soon as they’re born, I entered the world humming. The doctor even told my parents that they had a singer. Riveting… maybe even promising… but then, plot twist: I was not a good singer in my younger years, I was purely an instrumentalist. I hadn’t found my voice yet and didn’t really start singing until I was already in college. Good ol’ late bloomer.
The first instrument I stuck with was the oboe, back in the fifth grade, going all the way to attending DePaul University in Chicago on scholarship as an Oboe Performance major with the hopes and dreams of becoming the principal oboist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Being of Puerto Rican/Mexican decent, I grew up in a musical Latino family, so there was always music in the house. My parents were involved in and started many music groups focused on sharing the love of God, both in Spanish and English. In the middle of my 7th grade school year, the saxophone player from their group, HeavenBound, had to step down, so my dad asked me if I wanted to learn how to play the saxophone. The sax seemed cool, so I accepted and he bought a cheap alto sax for me to start on (probably to make sure I stuck with it first before investing too much). That started my interest in picking up more instruments (along with my inner challenge of wanting to play more instruments than my dad). I would go into the basement and go at it: picking up my dad’s trumpet to learn fingerings and scales and try to play simple melodies, dabbling on the piano, my brother’s trombone. (Update: the trombone and I didn’t seem to speak the same language… we amicably parted ways). As a youngster, it was wild to spend my free time doing music, practicing, and performing with my family and people older than me, rather than hanging out with kids my own age. I was playing in front of thousands of people at a time in North America and Latin America, appearing on television and radio, but it was normal for me. It was all I knew.
My next adventure was having to audition for the high school jazz band against my will. That sounded dramatic haha. Let me just say this: I hated jazz. It would physically make me nauseous. I didn’t want to be in the jazz band, so I didn’t practice the music. My dad loved and played jazz, and he didn’t want any of us kids to not at least try, so through tears, I went through the audition material with him the night before the audition. I was more excited to be accepted into the jazz band than to actually play jazz in the band, but through the year I fell in love with it, even picking up flute and clarinet (thanks, Dad!). I will always appreciate that my dad pushed my brothers and I to always try and learn because if he hadn’t, the course of my musical career would look pretty different right now. That push and encouragement also led me to start teaching private music lessons at 15 years old.
I continued to play jazz through college, having the privilege of being in the 2nd top jazz band at DePaul University and even switching my major to Jazz Studies on saxophone in my last year. During my first two years at DePaul, I got my first taste of tour life playing woodwinds for the Christian gospel group, TRUTH, doing two Christmas tours and their Farewell Tour. Through my time on tour, I got to share the stage with Anthony Evans, Avalon, 4Him, Russ Lee, Kirk Sullivan, and more. After three years at DePaul, I transferred to Elmhurst University for three years where I continued playing the sax in their worldwide acclaimed jazz band and joining their vocal jazz ensemble, Late Night Blues, becoming the jazz band’s vocalist in my last year and the student director of Late Night Blues my last two years. My time at Elmhurst gave me the opportunity to perform some amazing events around the world, including many European jazz festivals such as the Umbria Jazz Festival, as well as singing the mythical language of Elvish in the Chicago stop of Howard Shore’s Lord of the Rings Symphony tour. Some amazing musicians and singers I was able to perform with include Eric Marienthal, Patti Austin, John Pizzarelli, Nnenna Freelon, Orbert Davis, Sissel, Chicago Sinfonietta, Brett Eldredge, Matt Harris, just to name a few.
Once I graduated from Elmhurst, I was asked to join their faculty in teaching private lessons in classical saxophone and vocal jazz improvisation, as well as directing their vocal jazz ensembles and teaching a course on Vocal Jazz Techniques. The door to wedding and corporate gigs also opened up and I started to circulate the Chicago gigging scene, as well as the opportunity to serve for seven years on the house worship team at the Okoboji Bible and Missionary Conference in Iowa before I made the decision to make the move to Nashville in January of 2010 with a rough demo of original songs in hand.
Although I had friends from my tour days that lived in Nashville, I had to pretty much start over and find my way into the music scene here. I started in church, and through connections there started to work my way into getting work in town, as well as writing and recording some new music in the studio. Through church/ministry family, I was also able to share the stage with Kirk Franklin, BeBe Winans, Steve Green, Phil Keaggy, to name some, and each experience was a huge blessing. The first gigging band that I joined was a rock cover band, Stoopid Kool, as their keyboardist initially, then adding sax, flute, and lead female vocals. From there I got into the wedding and corporate gigging scene performing with Skyline Drive Band and Emerald Empire Band, which continued my networking with some amazingly talented musicians. I even wrote and recorded new music with the amazing producer, Michael Whittaker. I also had many life events happen, relatively close to each other, including two major car accidents that the officers said I shouldn’t have made it and that put me in physical therapy for a while. These, and other, events temporarily changed the course of my musical focus as I tried to get my feet back on the ground. Eventually, I was able to get that creative spark back. The whole time that I was navigating the Nashville music scene, I was also working various corporate jobs and currently do marketing/graphic design as well.
I also still do and will continue to do ministry work. It is very important to me, and again I get to share it with family in our group, Faith to Faith, where I sing and play the woodwinds and am the vocal director. I also regularly serve at church on the worship team.
Recently, I’ve been working on new music content with the very talented Junior Padilla, producer at JPAD Music, as a recording artist as well as sync licensing and film scoring, while continuing to perform live music internationally. Needless to say, life is incredibly busy haha, but I am extremely blessed and thankful to God for all of the experiences that have taught me, stretched me, broke me, restored me, and the amazing people that He has brought into my life. Everything I’ve been blessed to do I look at it as that: a blessing. Yes, I worked hard, but not in my own strength. The good and the bad parts of the journey have created a unique path and story, and I’m humbled by the opportunities I’ve been able to be a part of.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It definitely hasn’t been a smooth road. As I mentioned before, there have been some obstacles of personal situations and accidents that I allowed to sidetrack my creative progress and process. I’ve gone through, like I’m sure many others have, many insecurities, and doubts. It’s really easy to compare yourself to other people, especially when it seems like success has come to them easily. The issue is that our perception, as real as it feels, is not usually reality. I’ve spoken with some dear friends whom, on the outside, seemed to have it all together and have grown and progressed well in their creative journey. The reality, I found, was similar to mine where they were doubting themselves along the way, battling insecurities and feelings of not being good enough or worthy enough. Those things only keep us from doing some powerful things, they are spiritual battles that attack our minds, and they stunt growth and rob others of being blessed and encouraged by what God has placed in us to create and do. For me, those inner battles have been the most challenging. Those manifest into inaction, and it’s easy to blame other people or circumstances, but I’ve learned that regardless of what comes my way, the only thing that can really stop me from moving forward is me. Life might throw things at me that make it difficult, but it will just change the path to how I get there… but it shouldn’t change THAT I get there. And “there” might look different than where I first imagined, but I know it can and will still be fulfilling as long as I stay the course.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I’m a singer/musician/songwriter (simply put), but I’ve found that in town I’ve been referred to as “the singer/sax chic with the low A” haha. To many, that doesn’t mean much, but in the saxophone community it, I guess, has made me stand out. I mainly play alto sax (although I also play tenor and soprano) and I play on a Selmer Mark VI with a low A. There weren’t many of these horns made, and I’m guessing that many haven’t seen one in person, so they get excited when they see what horn I play on. I was first a saxophonist/instrumentalist before I was a singer, and I’ve heard people tell me that the way I sing and process arrangements is that of an instrumentalist, so although it might sound like it’s the same thing, I’m a saxophonist/instrumentalist who is also a singer as opposed to a singer who is also a saxophonist/instrumentalist. I think it gives me a different edge in how I see, hear, and perform music. Either way, I take both singing and instrument playing seriously and am passionate about both sides.
I perform live, but I also do studio session work. Although I mainly sing and play the saxophone, I also play other woodwinds (oboe, flute, clarinet) and piano. I write my music at the piano and start my recording process with that and then adding vocals to that (or I come up with a vocal idea and then go straight to the piano to add the chordal structure around it).
Although I sing/play many styles of music from Latin to pop, my heart always pulls me to the jazz/R&B/soul genres. I’ve fought against it a lot, but my heart keeps pulling me back in and it really is where I feel most at home in my performance and recording. Having a background in classical music from my oboe performance days, though, I always love going back to symphonic work which has sparked efforts in film scoring as well as sync licensing.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/CatchTheMelody
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CatchTheMelody
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq33UNcwDnfJsfiYE9xBVyQ
Image Credits:
Junior Padilla
