Hi.
I'm Luis.
A musician.
A cellist.
And a teacher... almost by accident.
When I was studying at the conservatory, I had a pretty clear picture of how my life was supposed to look.
Stages.
Orchestras.
Festivals.
Long hours playing.
Very few hours teaching.
Teaching was never part of the plan.
Honestly, it terrified me.
Right after I graduated, a local school called.
They needed a music teacher.
Urgently.
I said no.
Two days later, I checked my bank account again.
I called them back.
I figured I could survive one year.
That was my first mistake.
The second was thinking I knew how to teach.
I was 24.
No experience.
Standing in front of thirty teenagers with a whole lot more energy than I had.
The first few months were a complete mess.
But little by little, I started figuring something out.
When students enjoy what they're doing, they learn.
And when a group shares a project they genuinely care about...
Something happens.
One year, I decided to try something different.
I suggested we put on a musical.
I looked for one.
Then another.
Then another.
Nothing felt right.
So I did the only thing that made sense at the time.
I wrote my own.
Probably not my smartest decision.
For weeks I wrote at night, composed whenever I could, and learned about sound, lighting, and stage design the hard way.
Opening night finally arrived.
A lot could have gone wrong.
Some of it did.
But something much more important happened.
The kids were proud.
Really proud.
At the end of the school year, they handed me a letter signed by almost the entire class.
I still have it.
That was the moment I stopped thinking of teaching as something temporary.
Years later, I was still writing musicals.
Each one a little better.
Each one a little easier to produce.
Until one day I thought:
"If this helped my students... maybe it could help someone else's too."
That's how Kaikana was born.
With my brothers.
They're musicians too.
And with a team of talented people who somehow make every idea better than it was the day before.
Today, we're still doing exactly the same thing.
We make the kind of musicals I wish someone had handed me on my very first day as a teacher.
The kind that are easy to produce.
Fun to rehearse.
And just as rewarding for the people directing them as they are for the kids performing them.
If you've made it this far, thanks.
Really.
And if one day one of our musicals ends up on your stage...
I hope you enjoy it as much as we've enjoyed creating it.
— Luis