Hailed for his rich baritone vocals,
Lee Shanel draws upon the profound
influences of his studies, his Puerto Rican
"Bohemian Latin-Romantica" heritage,
the Classical Great Masters, and Retro-Jazz.
This Bohemian Latin-Romantic balladeer got his start performing at a young age, touring through
houses of worship in the tropics. At the age of 12, Lee Shanel started strumming the guitar in his birth
city of Ponce, Puerto Rico under the mentoring of Professor Rafael Moreno. However, it wasn’t u...
Hailed for his rich baritone vocals,
Lee Shanel draws upon the profound
influences of his studies, his Puerto Rican
"Bohemian Latin-Romantica" heritage,
the Classical Great Masters, and Retro-Jazz.
This Bohemian Latin-Romantic balladeer got his start performing at a young age, touring through
houses of worship in the tropics. At the age of 12, Lee Shanel started strumming the guitar in his birth
city of Ponce, Puerto Rico under the mentoring of Professor Rafael Moreno. However, it wasn’t until his
secondary education when he realized that he wanted to embrace music. “Watching my high-school
music teacher, Mrs. Olga Bernal, conduct a one hundred piece chorale through ‘The Hallelujah Chorus’
from Handel’s Messiah, stirred something and I knew music was my calling,” smiles Lee Shanel. The
wide-ranging musical milieu of his youth instilled within him a passion for music ranging from church
music to classical conducting. In addition to the rich and unique personal experiences, he draws
inspiration from iconic musicians spanning multiple genres. He admires the golden baritone voice of
gospel minister Wintley Phipps and finds himself immersed in one of the most important Puerto Rican
composers of the 20th century, Rafael Hernández Marín. Luther Vandross, Michael McDonald, Frank
Sinatra, and Nat “King’ Cole have added additional impressions on his sound cultivating a diverse
lineage of musical influence which he expanded through his collegiate study of music.
(For an expanded version of this biography, goto: http://www.leeshanel.com/Biography.html)
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