“Soulful music man” Doncker and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Komunyakaa to debut new release during NPR’s Dodge Poetry Festival
LISTEN TO TWO TRACKS FROM BIG APPLE BLUES HERE
(New York, NY) – September 5, 2014 – Independent Music Promotions today announced the upcoming release of Big Apple Blues, the collaborative effort by legendary poet Yusef Komunyakaa and musical renaissance man Tomás Doncker. Big Apple Blues is the second collaboration between Doncker and Komunyakaa. The first was The Mercy Suite, which featured performances by Meshell Ndegeocello, Chocolate Genius, and Living Colour lead singer Corey Glover. The pair will officially introduce Big Apple Blues during the Dodge Poetry Festival (October 23-26), sponsored by The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation. More information on the project is available on the official website of Doncker’s record label, True Groove.
An integral member of New York City’s downtown “no wave” scene in the early 1980’s, Tomás Doncker cut his teeth as a guitarist with groups such as James Chance & The Contortions, Defunkt, J. Walter Negro & The Loose Jointz, and many more. Eventually he went international, touring and recording in Japan with jazz pianist Masabumi Kikuchi, and producing studio and songwriting sessions with Bootsy Collins, Yoko Ono, Grammy-nominated reggae vocal group The Itals, and Grammy-winning producer Prince Charles Alexander.
Since then, Doncker has continued to work with an A-list of iconic musicians, including Ivan Neville (on his solo album Thanks), Bonnie Raitt, former P-Funk keyboardist Amp Fiddler, and 2013 Grammy nominee Shamekia Copeland. This summer Doncker released his full-length Moanin’ at Midnight: The Howlin’ Wolf Project. Developed during a critically acclaimed run at NYC SummerStage during the summer of 2013 (and directed by award-winning director Alfred Preisser), this project is now being shaped into a multimedia performance concert. Doncker and his True Groove label have been featured in a wide range of prominent media, including CNN, Guitar World, The Source, and Huffington Post.
According to PoetryFoundation.org, Yusef Komunyakaa “weaves together the elements of his own life in short lines of vernacular to create complex images of life in his native Louisiana and the jungles of Vietnam.” From his humble beginnings as the son of a carpenter, Komunyakaa has traveled far and wide to become a scholar, professor, and prize-winning poet. In 1994, he claimed the Pulitzer Prize and the $50,000 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award for his Neon Vernacular: New and Selected Poems.
Bruce Weber of the New York Times calls Komunyakaa “a Wordsworthian type whose worldly, philosophic mind might be stirred by something as homely and personal as a walk in a field of daffodils.” Weber continues, “His poems, many of which are built on fiercely autobiographical details—about his stint in Vietnam, about his childhood—deal with the stains that experience leaves on a life, and they are often achingly suggestive without resolution.”
For more information on Big Apple Blues, visit True Groove’s social media: OFFICIAL SITE | FACEBOOK
