Gabriel: Profile

The STA Travel office looks like an Ikea showcase, with yellow and purple walls, and a mahogany ceiling. Over in a corner sits a man, underneath a neon Peterpan Bus sign, fiddling with an electric bass plugged into a travel amp. I ask him if it’s all right if I interview him for an assignment, due in two hours, detailing his life story. He says yes, but then seems to forget why I was here. The next thing I know, I’m behind the desk with a 12-string acoustic guitar and we’re jamming to a standard 12-bar blues. He laughs sporadically, changes topics of conversation without the slightest hesitation, and flies through his history of musical tastes, disregarding any polite questions on my part to clarify or expand on any of the information. Eventually, as my time grew short, we settled down to business.Michael Piedra I was born in Holyoke, Ma. 38 years ago. He grew up in a bilingual household, with two Ecuadorian parents and three brothers. He attended Holyoke Catholic High school where he kept mostly to himself. Not one for sports, Michael started playing guitar after his first experience listening to the Beatles. After high school, and a number of temporary jobs, including restaurant work and clerical temping, he spent a year at UMass Amherst, but decided the college scene wasn’t for him. He found a job at the University hotel and worked under his musician friend “Dave” for six years. While working at the hotel, Michael played around the area with his garage band, playing almost every weekend, all weekend. “I’d basically be up from Friday morning until Sunday night,” he said. In 1996 he began working for the University’s travel department.Michael met his wife Brenda in the mid-90s. After seven years of dating, they tied the knot in 1994, and soon had a son, Michael Pieda II. He describes his marriage and the birth of his son as his two life-changing moments. As a self-proclaimed art lover, he can rattle off an impressive list of musical interests and influences, ranging from Itzach Pearlman to the Australian guitarist John Williams, from Shostakovich to Kansas. His current rock band, Second Nature, recently released a rock cd, Innocenz Lozt, featuring a silhouette of the band against a purple sky. They rarely perform now, but keep together out of a love of music. He views his rock career as a casual hobby – one that he can take to work. “I’m a very ‘not going to die more than 30 miles from where I was born’ kind of guy – very much Western Mass.,” he said as he sank back into his bass.