Expertise
Piano
Education
- BM, Ithaca College
- MM, Boston University
Biosketch
Professor Mele has taught music at UMass Lowell since 1974 and was appointed professor of music in 1988. He was coordinator of jazz studies from 1979 to 1982 and was chairperson of the department from 1982 to 1996. He returned to classroom and private piano teaching until his retirement in 2002. He continues to teach private piano on a part time basis.
Mele also worked in New York City where he coached vocalists in the theatrical and classical music genres and where he performed in several on and off Broadway musical theater productions. He is the pianist and one of the composers/arrangers of the Dream Keepers, an ensemble of three professional musicians who perform composed, improvised and original music to the narration of poetry by Langston Hughes.