Voyage LA: Check Out Sam Borrello’s Story

Written By Sam Borrello
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Today we’d like to introduce you to Sam Borrello. 

Hi Sam, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I started out playing the piano around seven years old and experimented with a bunch of different instruments including violin, clarinet and bass before settling on the electric guitar as my instrument of choice. As I was learning these instruments, I went through different musical phases throughout middle school and got really into Classic Rock, Rap and the Grunge scene, especially Nirvana. Once I got to high school, my tastes expanded to include Jazz and early 2000’s/90’s era hip hop. I grew up in Burlington, Vermont and at the time, there was a pretty strong community of Hip Hop heads. I remember downloading (ahem…totally legally) a new classic album just about every night and listening while doing my homework and before going to sleep. That area has some great music venues and I caught my first Hip Hop show (Jurassic 5 and X Clan) at a place called Higher Ground, which made a lasting impression.

Burlington has a strong Jazz scene as well and I began studying with a great guitar player and teacher named Paul Asbell who got me started learning to play jazz. After high school, I decided to attend the University of the Arts in Philadelphia to continue my musical studies. I remember thinking that learning jazz music would give me the freedom to play just about anything. While I was at UArts, I joined a Jazz/Funk/HipHop group called ILL Doots which became the driving musical force in my life for the next 10years. The band was great in that we were all studying jazz music in school but on our own time, we were learning about J Dilla, James Brown, Outkast, etc. It was also huge! Haha. We had rappers, horns, the whole 9 yards so it felt like a party just about every time we performed. Being in ILL Doots was an amazing experience, we put out tons of music together, toured nationally four times and expanded our efforts to include music education, theater and activism. 

Once I graduated UArts, I stayed in Philly and worked as a guitarist, music teacher and producer, putting out some of my own music under the moniker BPad. That city has some of the most incredible artists and musicians in the world and I feel very fortunate to have lived and worked there doing what I love. The level of musicianship and talent is very high and I think my musicianship grew considerably just by constantly feeling inadequate. 

After nine years in Philly, I was ready for a change. I had been focusing more and more on music production and decided to attend a one-year graduate program at Berklee College of Music in Valencia, Spain. The program was an awesome mix of music production, engineering, AV classes and performance. It was incredible to work with producers and musicians from all over the world and to be exposed to so many different cultures, languages, perspectives, etc. in a short amount of time.

Since graduating, I have moved to California and have been working here as a producer, mix-engineer and guitar teacher over the past year and a half. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It hasn’t been easy at all but in general, I’ve found the struggles are worth being able to primarily do what I love for a living. One of the biggest challenges has been learning how to demand value from myself. It takes time to be able to discern whether a gig, production job, etc., is worth your time and what the value of it is monetarily and for your career. I’ve found that the more you know your own worth the easier it is to demand value and be respectful of the time and effort you put into your work. I think in general music and the arts are pretty undervalued so if you’re not careful, you’re likely to be underpaid, stretch yourself too thin or mismanage your time. 

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I specialize in music production. I’m available for production work whether that be creating full-length tracks, selling beats, mixing projects or recording instrumental parts. I also teach both guitar and music production lessons. I have produced for artists including Homeboy Sandman, Khemist, Zeek Burse, A.Rob and Aliah Sheffield to name a few. I’ve been fortunate to have studied and worked within a wide range of genres so I can be flexible as far as style and approach while remaining authentic. 

I also release my own music and plan to continue doing much more of that. Last year I put out an album that I’m proud of entitled ‘Light Shift’ which was a definite departure from my previous work…that’s available everywhere now! As far as what I’m focused on now, I have a few projects in the works. I’m finishing up an album for the artist ‘The Pastor Jul’…that’s gonna be a real soulful project, looking forward to dropping that. I’m also working on a solo EP and a full-length album producing for a bunch of my favorite artists I’ve met over the years. Looking to drop those in the Fall so def stay tuned for that. Finally, I’m finishing up a long-overdue project with US from ILL Doots. 

Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
Hmm, that’s a tough one, haha. I feel lucky that I’ve had the good fortune of being around the right people and in the right place for my career at the right times. 

Contact Info:

Sam Borrello
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