We were lucky to catch up with Luca Sormani recently and have shared our conversation below.

Luca, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

At the age of 15, during my first day of high school, I was still learning English & by mistake I entered the music class instead of P.E. Class, Mrs. Joy Devlin, the music teacher made all of us get up and began singing as she played the piano, all of the sudden she stopped playing & asked: whose dark strong voice was that? We all stayed quiet so she began going through each one & when it was my turn I began singing & I remember her opening her eyes shocked, she told me come see after school, so I went back & she told me: you’ll be my next project, I’m going to get you into vocal lessons, you have a gift & just like that, due to a mistake in classes I ended up finding out that I had a voice for singing, of course, financially I wasn’t able to cover for the lessons so she covered part of it while I used to sell hot Cheetos around the school to pay for the other half. Joy Devlin became a mother a to me, she nurtured me, took care of me, made sure I had a plate of food in my table, celebrated my birthday since my mom had to work a lot & I didn’t get to spend much time with her.

Luca, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I come from two cultures the Italian and the Peruvian, I’m the mix of Europe and South America, I migrated to the US when I was 12, no family, no friends, no connections, just my backpack full of dreams & the confusion of the age as my mom waited for me in a taxi outside of LAX. I began my career in high school, when my music teacher Joy Devlin discovered me, she put me in vocal lessons, then the school hired for the main events & then I began singing at the opera houses, when I turned 18 I began leading worship at my local church & then other churches became interested in me so they would hire me, I guess they were curious of my size in comparison to the strength of my voice, I later became the worship director & we got to travel and perform at festivals, crusades while I was still doing residency at several opera houses, then I met Maxwell David, whom had just relocated from the UK to LA he became my mentor, introducing me to new genres & pop and soul sounds, he also opened the doors for me to social media allowing a new audience to get to know me, sadly in 2019 my journey as a worship director ended, one of the pastors asked me to leave the church because he found out about my sexual orientation, that experience changed me forever, it marked me to the point where I thought God was upset at me for being who I am, I’m an introvert so I wasn’t able to open up about that experience for years, I didn’t commit any crime & I had placed my own dreams on hold to build the ministry, I forgave but the scars remain, then with the advise of Mr. David I migrated from classical music to more pop sounds where I felt more comfortable & in 2021 with the help of Ani Kresse & Rasec Marc I was able to release my first single, I didn’t expect 10,000 people to listen to it in only 24 hours, that scared me but I’m so thankful people liked it, later that year i went through my first break up after 2 years of building a family, that particular experience brought me to my knees, I was diagnosed with chronic depression so I am aware now of my mental health, I try as much as possible to take care of myself, I placed my projects on hold until I felt ready. I decided to focus in commercial real estate for the last two years but many friends and specially my manager Pauline Samuels have advised me that I should return to music, so I’m seriously thinking about it, sometime in 2024, I’m currently negotiating with several producers about it & I would like to return with a fresh sound, I’m a perfectionist so I want to give people the best I can, it will be about heartbreak with orchestral sounds, I love that idea, I’m excited for next year and I’m thankful for this ending one, I met my Filipino family, they make me feel at home, I’m grateful for all of them and for the lessons 2023 has left me. I can’t wait to finally return to the stage.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

The most rewarding aspect of this journey is the love of people and the way the appreciate your art, until this day I have people coming up to me saying that they remember me while I used to perform at the evangelical festivals or people telling me they love the way my voice has brought them to tears, that’s something I never imagined having, so in honor of that I want to return to keep sharing this gift.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

I have several but the one that marked me forever was when I was asked to not return to church for my sexual orientation, I had given my everything to the ministry, day and night, I remember walking out to the parking lot with my bag, in tears and thinking, I am done, I am a failure, it took me months to heal and finally accept myself, as I mentioned before I forgave them but the scars remain.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://instagram.com/luca_sormani23?igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@sormani4083?si=-02akw3DGhBy-NwJ

Image Credits
Photographer: Kip Knight from KippinnitREEL productions