Meet Michele Romeo

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Michele Romeo. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Michele, thank you for being such a positive, uplifting person. We’ve noticed that so many of the successful folks we’ve had the good fortune of connecting with have high levels of optimism and so we’d love to hear about your optimism and where you think it comes from.
I would probably say that my optimism comes from my family. When I had an issue, my parents used to tell me that every problem has a solution. I remember that when I was a kid, at some point in our life, my family was not in a very good financial state. I remember, though, that my dad always had a positive attitude about that and was able to convey positive energy to the family. After working hard and finding out how to bring his dream job to life, my dad patented a product for the food industry: a magnetic glove that you can wear using only one hand. I remember when I was a kid, many friends and family used to make fun of him and call him crazy because he was quitting his main job as a hairdresser to follow his dream job. After 10 years of sacrifices and hard work, our life completely changed, and I can absolutely say that this is one of the most inspiring stories I have observed in my life, encouraging me to be optimistic and believe that dreams can turn into reality with hard work and belief. I really want to say thanks to my dad for inspiring me so much because I couldn’t have a better example. Even though I work in the music industry, anytime I feel discouraged, the main light in my mind to keep moving and stay positive is my dad’s story!

Despite this, my teenage years were quite complicated because when I was 13 years old, I was diagnosed with a very rare eye disease, and I became blind at the age of 18. Overall, it was complicated to process the full experience of becoming blind, but at the same time, I had the chance to start perceiving life in a different way, and sometimes I feel that my blindness opened new channels to my world perception. After recovering and readjusting to my new condition, I realized that the strong love I had for life earlier is still with me. My enthusiasm towards life is something that has always been with me. Sometimes we all go through tough moments, but the most important thing to remember is that the next day something amazing can happen, and we just need to be patient. I just realized over the years that feeding depression or negative feelings is not really what I want. Saying this, I don’t want to say that I’m always positive every day of my life because I’m a human being, but I learned that if we smile at the world, the world is going to smile back at us! I have learned, and I’m still learning, to put myself in the perspective of someone who observes what happens around. I felt I became more optimistic when I started not to give too much energy to any single thought but rather choose with more awareness what direction I want to take!

When I compose music, I try to involve as much as I can my emotional statement. A few years ago, after a meditation practice with my therapist, I came up with a little fragment of reflections I made regarding my perception of life. The song I’m referring to is called ‘I Do Like You But,’ and I put this fragment in Japanese because it is the closest language to Buddhism. I do not consider myself Buddhist, but Buddhist philosophy in the past few years has helped me a lot during my process of exploration. I would love to end the first part of this interview by including the fragment of my song translated into English, and I hope you enjoy it!

’I know that there are several inevitable and eternal things in life. One of these is pain, but another one is our breath.

Take a deep breath, let your body become a unique thing with the universe, and feel yourself present in this moment.

You can be whatever you would like to be. You can be the wind, you can be fire, you can be the sun admiring the planets around you.

I just want you to be happy in every moment of this miracle called life.’

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
As you may have read in the previous part, I work in the music industry. I’m Michele Romeo, a 31-year-old guitar player, composer, and audio engineer who lives in New York City. I moved to the United States in 2017 to attend my dream school, Berklee College of Music. I graduated from Berklee in Boston in 2020 during the pandemic and immediately relocated to New York City where I work as a music instructor, guitar player, and mixing engineer.

Lately, besides working on my solo project, I’ve been the lead guitar player for the rock band La Pucelle, a band I started working with since November 2023. I’m very excited to be part of this band because there is a wonderful energy with the musicians and the manager!

Regarding my solo project, I have a quartet where I play my own compositions, a combination of Jazz and Rock music that I consider fusion.

I started composing at a very young age; my first tune was written when I was 15 years old, and my very first music album was recorded when I was 18 years old. Although I consider that very first album far from my current music taste, knowledge, and skills, I still like to talk about it because it is still a part of who I was earlier, and definitely, that experience helped me during my music growth! The album is called “Leaves,” and it is available on all streaming platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music.

If I had to talk about my most recent compositions, I would recommend listening to my composition ‘I Do Like You But’ because it really represents in the best way who I am today musically, not only in terms of guitar skills but especially from the point of view of experimenting with harmony and sounds!

Lately, I have been trying to push myself beyond my boundaries, trying to do things that challenge me, and I have found out that even though it’s tough at the beginning, after many hours of studying and practicing, I can see my results, and I can guarantee that it is really a matter of how much we are pushing ourselves. I do not consider myself a genius at all; I really need to work very hard to see good results. I would like to say that I am exploring every day my threshold of patience in working hard until the point I need to take a break to process what I have been working on.

To mention some of the new compositions I have been creating in the past few weeks, you can listen to a little fragment of this last tune called ‘In The Ocean’ on my IG channel @micheleromeomusic. I’m still considering if I’m going to include this last tune as part of a new album or release it as a single, as I did for all the new compositions available on streaming platforms since 2021. All the new compositions that I released since January 2021 have been recorded and mixed by myself.

For sure, at some point, I would love to come up with a new album that can represent in the best way who Michele Romeo is today. I’m working on new compositions, but it is still early to talk about a finished product.

In the past few years, beyond working on my solo projects, I worked for a very talented Ukrainian artist named Valeriia Kuzmuk, whose art name is Valeriia Vovk. I produced her very first EP album named ‘In The Field’ where I played guitars, bass, I arranged in part with her, and I mixed the full album. That was a very fun experience as a music producer! Valeriia is a very talented singer-songwriter; we met at Berklee College of Music, and she started working with me during one of my mixing techniques classes. Among the songs we worked on together, Valeriia released the tune called ‘Vesna’ that you can find on all streaming platforms!

Another artist I worked for in the past few years is Valerie Giglio, an electro-swing singer-songwriter where I mainly worked as a mixing engineer! There are many singles available on all streaming platforms where I worked, but the most popular one is for sure the EP Electro Jingle Swing that I mixed in November 2021.

Regarding other artists I worked for beyond my own music, you can find out more by exploring my website www.micheleromeomusic.com.

What else can I say about me? This is what I do as a Professional Musician, but there are many other activities I enjoy doing! I love to work out, and lately, I have been experiencing rock climbing, which is a super fun activity! I speak English and Spanish fluently, and Italian is my native language. Before going to Berklee College of Music, I also graduated in languages to be an interpreter for English and Spanish. I graduated from IULM University in Milan, one of my favorite Italian cities.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
The main thing I can recommend is to be determined and patient. Sometimes I consider myself a little bit lazy, but at the same time, I have always kept a certain consistency with what I do, and that’s why today I can say that a very good part of the things that I imagined when I was younger became true. I still have a lot of dreams and a lot of plans that I wish they will become true at some point, and my main suggestion to everybody is to be active and persistent.

As I said earlier, I’m not a genius… I simply enjoy what I do and I try to give my best. I’m still exploring who I am. I try to connect the mechanical side of music with the heart side, and this last one, in my opinion, is the most important to bring out our identity.

What has been your biggest area of growth or improvement in the past 12 months?
I would say that in the past 12 months, I have really experienced so many things in New York City that I feel much more confident with myself as a person and also as a musician. New York is a tough place, and in 12 months, I have been able to play with many amazing musicians, and all the new musical connections I made inspired me for my composing side as well. Being able to sustain myself here was definitely a great achievement. I have been exploring so many different dynamics that I feel all of this is letting me become a more independent person!

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