Mundo Juillerat, comes from the island of Oahu, Hawaii. He grew up surrounded by polynesian music because his Mother, Aunty, and cousins were dancers in Hula (Halaus) and Tahitian dance troupes. Starting off on the Ukulele, he graduated to playing guitar and the Toeti’ (tahitian log drum) in various Hawaiian shows at the age of thirteen. Notably with the long running Kai’polani’s Hula Show and then with Tama and the Hula Nanis.
Moving to the States, Mundo has worked professionally non-stop since 1981. Studying with Jennifer Batten, Scott Henderson, Joe Diorio, and Frank Gambale, he obtained a vocational diploma with honors from the Guitar Institute of Technology in 1987. Mundo has also studied Flamenco guitar with Phillip Amundson at the University of Nevada Reno. In keeping up with his professional musicianship he’s continued his studied from Bruce Conte of Tower of Power, jazz master Joe Lano, and gypsy jazz artist Andreas Oberg.
Mundo has performed and toured constantly, making Las Vegas his home base in 1991 when he joined EMI-Capitol recording artist Anita Sarawak and her band The American Dream. In a ten year stint he performed at Caesars Palace as the house band in Cleopatra’s Barge, as well as numerous concert appearances in Asia from 2,000 seat theater to 30,000 seat stadium concerts. Some of the artists he’s performed with are Brian McKnight, Sheena Easton, Sophie B. Hawkins, Melissa Manchester, David Coverdale of Whitesnake, Bill Champlin and members of the band Chicago, Justin Hayward (Moody Blues), The Commodores, Martin Nievera, Michael Grimm, Marilynn McCoo & Billy Davis Jr., Danny Gans, Wayne Newton, Clint Holmes, Gonzalo Bergara, Gypsy Fire, and Santa Fe and the Fat City Horns.
In recent years he’s worked in some of Las Vegas’ biggest production shows. Starting with “Storm” and then a 6 year stint in the Guitar 1 chair of Mamma Mia! at the Mandalay Bay Resort. Currently he’s the guitarist with the Le Reve show at the Wynn Resort.
Mundo has and continues to work in the music industry. As a sought out guitar instructor he’s taught beginners to touring pros, and has done clinics in the United States as well as in Japan. He’s also done three instructional guitar videos and has authored one instructional book. As an artist for Washburn Guitars ( U.S. Music Corp.) he’s worked as a clinician at NAMM and other trade shows for 7 years. His clinician work has led to direct involvement with product development for Washburn and U.S. Music Corp’s Consumer products. This involves beta- testing, reviewing products, visualizing new products, writing manuals and representing U.S. Music Corp in product meeting with other companies such as Disney and Artec. When U.S. Music Corp was sold in 2009 he continued working in product development with a new company, Ediface Digital LLC in 2010.
Throughout his career Mundo has done countless session and recording work. Recently most of his guitar session work is done in his studio Ka Hale Ilio. He is also starting to explore soundtrack recording, by way of his work with composer Michael Brennan. He’s produced a few artists mainly in demo form, and is most proud of his role of Producer with The Hot Club of Las Vegas’, debut CD.
With the Hot Club of Las Vegas starting off as a passion project, it has now formed into a viable music product. As a career sideman making his living as a funk and hard rock “shredder,” Mundo has changed course by expanding his “art” with learning new picking techniques, new harmonic concepts and re-inventing himself as a gypsy jazz artist. As the leader of this band, Mundo Juillerat is very excited about the possibilities of this new musical adventure!
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