Born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, I moved to Sydney, Australia in 1978. After ten years in Sydney as new immigrants, my family and I discovered Cairns, North Queensland on a holiday and knew instantly that this was our place.
We moved up shortly after. In 1992, I was first exposed to the arts at Grafton Arts, a Cairns City Council funded Youth Arts Centre that supported and developed aspiring young artists from any discipline. From those early days until now, I have always been involved in Youth Arts and I’m forever grateful for those foundational experiences. See CV for more info.
At 19, I joined Kick Arts Collective in Cairns, where I was taken under the wing by various senior accomplished artists across disciplines such as music, dance, theatre, and visual arts. Over the following three years, I acquired the knowledge akin to a classical arts education. The lessons learnt during this years, continue to inform every aspect of my professional practice.
It was time to venture over to Western Australia to study dance at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts, Edith Cowan University. Later, my passion for Latin dance saw me flying between Melbourne and Sydney, performing professionally and learning the art of teaching with Australia’s foremost exponents of Latin Dance.
Finally settling back in Perth in 2008, I founded a very successful World Music and Dance entertainment production and promotions company that pioneered for almost 10 years. Enjoying near-capacity bookings, we provided regular workshops and performances for local and state government, the youth and community sector, and were on the preferred providers and favourites list for the corporate, 5-star hotels, mining and petroleum end of town.
This profile opened up the opportunity to promote and tour international and national acts.
After many years of successful service delivery and the nurturing of strategic networks, I was able to break into the major electronic music festivals circuit. I was regularly engaged to deliver chill out stages, tents, unique spaces. Key responsibilities included design & theming, booking artists, curating line ups and risk mitigation.
In early 2017, I ventured into new territory, accepting a permanent position as Senior Youth Arts Worker at YMCA HQ, Perth. The birthplace of youth street dance in Perth and once a hotbed for youth music, where many famous Perth bands got their start. YMCA HQ was now a run-down old youth centre and eyesore for the local community. I was directly responsible for reactivating the space, achieving an increase of youth engagement of 90% over nearly 2.5 years (see CV for details).
COVID, I transitioned into the child protection, and to this day I continue to work in this important and challenging sector to. The majority of the time, this work is extremely challenging and confronting, at times it is inspiring and uplifting. It has fundamentally broadened my understanding of life and gifted me immeasurable lessons on how to serve.
In late 2022, I relocated back to Cairns after being away for 25 years. Whilst continuing my work in child protection, I have taken the necessary time to build a team of highly competent, multi-skilled artists and the due care to develop and collate the content within this website. In May 2023, I founded RHYTHM ARTS NORTH, a one-stop-shop for all things World Music and Dance. Upon launching, we have two primary sets of services.
1. We provide a range of interactive workshop experiences across a broad demographic.
2. Procurement and provision of quality entertainment and related services.
The RHYTHM ARTS NORTH team, are all life long creative professionals, we all consider it an honour and a privilege to share our skills and experience of music and dance with the community. We are committed to bringing the joy of World Music and Dance to North Queensland and beyond.