''Chad Bernstein is a rare musician,'' says dean Shelton Berg. ``He has such a big heart that it informs everything he plays, making you forget that he also has a big virtuosity. I believe that when all is said and done, he will have a profound impact in some way.''

In his copious free time, Bernstein does live and session work with artists including Daddy Yankee, Calle 13, Bruce Hornsby and Natalie Cole.

''Chad is a tasteful, soulful player,'' says Andrew Yeomanson, aka DJ LeSpam. ``His musical curiosity has led him to experiment with the conch shells and also the sousaphone and other brass. He clearly has a lot of reverence for the conch's deep and ancient tones, and although it's a real crowd-pleaser, he avoids using them gratuitously.''

Bernstein began playing piano at 3, and he picked up the trombone in fourth grade. He finds irony in the fact that he has spent 15 years playing the trombone, yet his facility with a shell gets the most crowd reaction and media response.

His connection with the conch is much more than a novelty. In many ways, the gastropod is symbolic of the Florida lifestyle this Northerner has adopted. ''I fell in love with conch when I moved here,'' he says at Scotty's, looking out over Biscayne Bay while eating, of course, conch salad. It's illegal to take conchs from Florida waters; Bernstein gathers his shells from the sea bottom on boat trips to Bimini.

''It's not like they run away from you,'' he says, laughing. ``This is straight from the ocean, completely natural. Conchs have a primal, Neanderthal quality. They're as natural as it gets.''

Conchs have to be cut to make a sound. Unfortunately, shells that have been damaged in order to harvest their meat cannot be used as instruments, a waste Bernstein regrets. He has a few shells, including the two he first bought in Key West and some he has crafted.

Most of the sound is produced through manipulation of the tongue and lips, as with the trombone and trumpet. Inserting a hand in the shell lowers the pitch. Big shells have lower pitches, small ones higher. Though they have a limited tonal range, the conchs Bernstein plays in Suenalo or with Spam exert a primal response from the audience.

''As soon as I played them people started reacting with energy,'' he says. ``It's your job as a musician to create some kind of synergy with the audience.''

Curiosity led Bernstein to the conch. He also has picked up the tuba and sousaphone and describes his South Miami house as a ``museum of instruments, anything I can make a sound out of.''

He has recently installed a recording studio, where he hopes to give back to the music scene that has given him so much. ``There's lots of talent, people who don't even have a demo. I'd like to help those people out.''

LEARNING PROCESS

Bernstein also sees himself as a kind of bridge between UM and the Miami club scene. ``I've been receiving an education on the street, too. They are not mutually exclusive.''

With his father he has formed the Guitars Over Guns Organization, a nonprofit dedicated to helping public-school students learn to play instruments. GOGO plans to start its first middle-school program in Miami in the fall.

Berg, the music dean, says that even though the conch may seem a novelty, 'I don't think Chad's conch playing distracts from the `seriousness' of his music. To me, the conch is another voice or medium of expression and, as such, can convey things that the trombone probably can't.''

Bernstein is a man of great talent and ambitions. But he's also aware that serendipity can be the greatest resource of all. ''I've had more great outcomes from mistakes, than things I planned,'' says the accidental conch player.

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