Mai Leisz: Once Upon A Time

From a tiny village in Estonia to the big stages of America, Mai Leisz’s musical metamorphosis has led her to play alongside David Crosby, Jackson Browne, and her own jazz fusion band, MaiGroup.

Mai Leisz: Once Upon A Time

From a tiny village in Estonia to the big stages of America, Mai Leisz’s musical metamorphosis has led her to play alongside David Crosby, Jackson Browne, and her own jazz fusion band, MaiGroup.

When it comes to backstories, Mai Leisz’s reads more like a fairytale than it does a musician bio. Add in a storybook romance straight out of a Hollywood movie and a surreal supporting cast, and that’s her life in a nutshell. Born in the tiny village of Leisi, Estonia with a population of 200, Leisz was sheltered from popular music due to regulations from the post-Soviet regime of the time. When she started playing the bass at 16 she was exposed to jazz through her music teacher’s guidance. As she gained more access to American jazz and pop music, Mai found tremendous influence in the playing of Jaco Pastorius, Gary Willis, Jimmy Johnson, Carol Kaye, and her first bass teacher Raul Vaigla. After moving away to Sweden to continue her bass studies, her bass was her only solace, until the moment that changed everything. It was a day in June 2015 when everything was going wrong for Mai, as she took the wrong metro on her way to busk in the streets of Stockholm with her friend Doug S
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Jon D'Auria   By: Jon D'Auria

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