Portuguese singer Lilly Abreu breaks down barriers with music

Lilly Abreu’s approach to working with a new voice student starts from a basic maxim: “Anyone who wants to sing should be able to sing.”

It has served as the defining principle of her two-decade teaching career at Carnegie Mellon University, Chatham University, Point Park University and Pittsburgh CLO Academy.

It has also inspired an ascendant performing journey as she toured and recorded on four continents, expanding her classical and sacred music roots to embrace an eclectic array of styles spanning pop, Broadway, opera, jazz and music of her native Brazil, from lambada and samba to bossa nova and choro.

And Disney. For years Abreu has been a first-call film singer dubbing Portuguese-language versions of “Beauty and the Beast,” “Aladdin,” “Pocahontas,” “Bambi,” “101 Dalmatians” and the voice of Cinderella in the Brazil company of “Disney on Ice.”

Locally, she’s adapted her musical talent to breaking down social barriers — teaching and singing for seniors and nursing home residents (Musicians with a Mission), special needs youth (Notes from the Heart) and adults with disabilities (Self-Advocacy Voices).

“There’s so much about singing that is useful in daily life,” she asserts. 

Fluency in Portuguese, English and Spanish drew her into international sales and marketing positions as a translator and interpreter. Since May 2023, she has worked as vendor manager and language access advocate for Global Wordsmiths, a Pittsburgh language translation and interpretation service.

NEXTpittsburgh caught up with Abreu as she prepared for her Feb. 16 Brazilian jazz concert at St. Stephen Lutheran Church in Green Tree celebrating the spirit of Brazil’s Carnival.

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NEXTpittsburgh: What can you share about your upcoming show at St. Stephen with the Brazilian Jazz Trio?

Lilly Abreu: I’m lucky to be in Pittsburgh doing Brazilian music with musicians who love Brazilian Jazz. I’m going to be doing jazz and classics of bossa nova, including the Antônio Carlos Jobim song “Quiet Nights and Quiet Stars.” I’ll sing “Mas Que Nada” from Brasil ’66. And, of course, I will sing “The Girl from Ipanema.”

What is special about this concert is that I’m working with some of my favorite musicians in Pittsburgh. Eric Susoeff is going to be the guitarist. Eric is kind of my arranger in a way, because we do a lot of the arrangements of the songs together, and he has the charts beautifully designed, and we share that with the other musicians.

The bass player is Dwayne Dolphin. He is a powerful soul that we have here in Pittsburgh. I love working with Dwayne. He loves Brazilian music, and he has a passion for it.

The other musician joining us is the percussionist Hugo Cruz. Hugo is from Cuba and is an amazing person and music professional. He’s bringing some of that Latin-Cuban mix to it. That’s a fun addition to the Brazilian jazz.

NEXTpittsburgh: What was the music that first interested you as a child?

Abreu: I was actually born in Portland, Maine, and raised in Pittsburgh. My father was a heart surgeon and did his medical residency here in the United States. We lived in Penn Hills, so my first musical memory was the American music I heard until we moved back to Brazil when I was 5. Every time I sing or hear Gershwin, it brings me back to my childhood in Pittsburgh.

In Brazil, I heard mostly classical and church music and became part of several church youth choirs. I learned guitar and then conducting and went to the conservatory at Universidade Federal de Goiás for my bachelor’s degree in voice.

Then my Dad said, “That’s OK, but you better have another degree to follow on.” My mom was an English teacher, and the English was coming back to me, so I got an English minor thinking I would teach English in Brazil and do a little music. I ended up teaching Portuguese in America and doing a lot of music. 

NEXTpittsburgh: How did you get involved in teaching voice?

Abreu: I was in college and some friends who were voice teachers came to me and said, “Hey, Lilly, I have a student who wants to study with me, but he cannot match pitch. Would you take this student?”

I said, “Sure!” And I created a system of teaching students who haven’t been formally trained or don’t have a “classical” voice but still want to learn how to sing, want to enjoy and learn new things. When I teach now at Carnegie Mellon, I teach students who are not voice majors. 

NEXTpittsburgh: You individualize your instruction for each student?

Abreu: Yes, I can tailor the classes according to their dreams. It’s good to listen and see what is it that the student wants. We start from where they are. It’s not based on the teacher but on what the student wants, so at the end of the semester, the student can get closer to their goal. 

I learn so much from them. We all have different abilities. If someone has an ability and a passion, how can I help them move forward and develop other abilities to complement and get where they want to go?

NEXTpittsburgh: You recently created a new nonprofit organization called Self-Advocacy Voices.

Abreu: This came out of the pandemic. My students who had participated in the Notes from the Heart summer camps wanted to be connected during the rest of the year. I talked to a few colleagues, and we decided to meet with some of the campers every other Saturday on Zoom. 

We pair a student with a mentor to prepare a PowerPoint presentation about their passion, something in their life they want to work on. Because we’re doing it online, we have mentors coming from all over the world. 

One young woman has Down syndrome and lives by herself. She’s proud of that. She said, “I want to talk about the fact that I live on my own, and the name of my presentation is going to be ‘A Home of My Own.’ ” We got her to meet with a mentor every seven weeks. We rehearsed her presentation. She would stutter, and we brought in a speech therapist. And an occupational therapist who would meet her and do exercises. So after eight weeks, she did her presentation.

NEXTpittsburgh: That sounds like a valuable program for almost anyone.

Abreu: Right? This could be good preparation if you’re looking for a job. You have to do an interview; you have to get used to sharing things about yourself. Part of my background is working with professionals who want to learn how to do presentations, project their voices, have good posture, have eye contact and get less nervous.

NEXTpittsburgh: Is it similar to your work training interpreters at Global Wordsmiths?

Abreu: Yes. We provide language services, and we also train translators and interpreters. We help organizations in Pittsburgh develop a program to offer interpretation and translations of their materials for immigrants and refugees here. A lot of our organizations — the hospitals, the schools — they’re not prepared. We show them how to serve this population better.

NEXTpittsburgh: Language access is becoming an important issue in our area.

Abreu: We firmly believe that language access is a civil right. Families that are coming to Pittsburgh need to feel that they are welcome and that we are a welcoming place. Language access is a service for them to feel safe. 

When you accept someone fully, you want to have an understanding of who they are and have a conversation. How can you communicate? How can you understand each other? How can you minimize the differences? How can you minimize the fear? Because what are we here for? What are we here for, if not to help each other?

NEXTpittsburgh: Music also seems to enhance our ability to communicate with each other.

Abreu: When I was in college, I won a competition sponsored by Camargo Guarnieri, a great Brazilian composer of the 20th century. I was having a class with him, and in the middle of the class, he stops talking. He starts playing the piano, and for five, 10 minutes he’s just playing. Then he stops, looks at me and says, “This is for you.” He had just — in those moments — composed a new piece of music!

Those memories of meeting gentle souls, of meeting creative souls, of meeting wonderful people throughout my life … I think that’s what I love about being a musician. Music brings us together. Music has that power to connect people; you don’t need to understand what they are singing or what they’re saying. Singing is like an opening to your soul.

Lilly Abreu and Her Brazilian Jazz Trio perform Friday, Feb. 16, at 7:30 p.m, for the Academy Concerts at St. Stephen Lutheran Church (55 Forsythe Road in Green Tree). Tickets here.