When Drumap was a prototype, its creator, Raul Rodrigues, presented the idea to the Latin Grammy Cultural Foundation and, bam! the magic was done. With a prize valued at around 5,000 euros for his contribution to the preservation of musical knowledge, everything was easier to make a mobile application that digitizes musical learning and creation a reality. “They gave me the award when it was just an idea and that money allowed me to leave the prototype so I could grow. Of course the validation of the Grammys helped me a lot,” explains Rodrigues, who after that accolade made his company a reality, today based in Valencia.

“On the way to Madrid I discovered the city, I loved it and I thought I would stay. And here I am,” he announces. Six years ago he already had experience in moving without fear, since from his native Brazil he had traveled to Argentina, the United States and Scotland. He came to Spain in search of a job and hoping that his Spanish ancestors would open the doors of Europe more easily for him.

He remembers that almost the first thing he knew about València was its entrepreneurial area, Marina de Empresas, where he now works at the Lanzadera incubator, shaping a project in which he always trusted. He first went through Jeff, the laundry startup that went through boom and bust. Last year the firm entered bankruptcy, but by then Rodrigues was already out of the project.

There he had been responsible for international expansion and even human resources. “I left a week before everything fell apart. When they told me that the second investor was not going to come in, I almost fainted… But I left because I wanted to create this project, not pursue a more corporate career. My passion was music,” explains the now CEO of Drumap.

He had studied drums and percussion and specialized in Brazilian music. He already had experience in entrepreneurship because he created a music school that he later ended up selling. “I always stayed between business and music.” With that suitcase he now works to scale his project, drawing on the knowledge of up to three programs: Juan Roig’s accelerator in Valencia, Lanzadera; the Barcelona-based Bcominator, which entered as an investor in his company; and the Music Tech Europe academy where he also learns as a startup.

The project currently has 30,000 users, and 1,000 of them pay for the content. It is through this subscription that the project monetizes the use and for the moment allows it to bill about 5,000 euros per month which, Rodrigues hopes, aspires to convert into 30,000 euros at the end of the year. Its objective is to invoice 20 million between the next three and six years.

With six people on staff, three of them in Valencia, the project is now focused on a financing round of 100,000 euros with which to attract new business angels. Among its next steps, improve its presence on social networks and in the audiovisual content of the app, which is divided between a drum coach and a sheet music editor for neophytes in the intense pleasure of hitting the cymbals and the drum. “It is very easy for people who don’t know about music to learn,” concludes the entrepreneur.