Mineola High School graduate Michelle Ferreira’s composition “Glass of Wine” has been nominated for Song of the Year in the first International Portuguese Music Awards competition.
The song is one of the tunes on her first album, “Stories Left Unsaid,” released in the fall of 2011. Ferreira’s song is one of four nominated in that category. She is also one of 14 nominees for the People’s Choice Award in the competition.
“It’s exciting,” Ferreira said. “It’s just nice that I’m doing something that I love and I can represent the Portuguese community.”
The International Portuguese Music Awards was created as an awards competition to recognize music produced outside of Portugal by artists with Portuguese ancestry. The awards categories span a range of genres from rock and pop to fado, a traditional form of Portuguese folk music.
“I have no idea how they found the music,” Ferreira said.
She said she was contacted recently and asked if she would like to submit material to be considered for the People’s Choice category. She was told earlier this week that “Glass of Wine” is up for Song of the Year in the inaugural International Portuguese Music Awards to be held at the Zeiterion Theater in New Bedford, Mass. on Feb 1.
Ferreira’s first album was nine months in the making. She said she started working on it in a Manhattan studio in January 2011 to record 10 tracks with the help of a fellow Mineola alumnus, Chris Wallitsch, who also co-wrote some of the songs with her. She recorded the instrumental tracks with Wallitsch and later recorded vocal tracks at The Cutting Room, a recording studio in Manhattan.
The recording can be purchased – or sampled – at www.bandcamp.com or on the MusicStore on her facebook page, www.facebook.com/michelleferreiramusic.
She’s been performing at different venues since the album’s release and is currently working on songs for a second album.
“I am writing right now,” Ferreira said.
The young Portuguese-American singer sees her style as a mix between pop and soul. She grew up listening to Portuguese and pop music. Ferreira said she admires vocalists such as Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holliday and also is influenced by The Beatles and contemporary rock musicians Adele and John Mayer.
Ferreira, 22, graduated from Pace University with a major in acting in 2011. But she’s had a lifelong love of singing, taking private voice lessons since she was eight years old.
In her senior year at Mineola, Ferreira attended the BOCES Long Island High School of the Performing arts.
She played Lola in “Damn Yankees” in her junior year at Mineola, and Hope Cladwell in the offbeat “Urinetown” in her senior year.
Her parents had given her a guitar during her freshman year at Pace, and after she learned the instrument, she played in front of a small audience at the Acoustic Cafe at Pace.
Ferreira said she’s looking forward to the opportunity to meet other musical artists from the Portuguese community at the New Bedford awards ceremony next month
Balloting for the International Portuguese Music Awards is online at http://www.internationalportuguesemusicawards.com/peoples-choice/.
