Somi at SubCulture

Acclaimed East African vocalist and songwriter, Somi, was born in Illinois to immigrants from Rwanda and Uganda, but has made Harlem her home. With the African and Jazz legacies critical to her sound, she is often referred to as a "modern day Miriam Makeba." Known for her wide vocal range and a solid body of self-penned story-based songs, The Boston Globe said her work “glistens with the sheen of an almost impossibly perfect cosmopolitanism" after her last studio album debuted at #2 on the Billboard World Chart and featured her legendary mentor Hugh Masekela. 
As her career has taken off, Somi’s talents have been called upon for collaborations and live performances alongside a diverse cast of artists including John Legend, Angelique Kidjo, Mos Def, Baaba Maal, Paul Simon, Idan Raichel, Jennifer Hudson, and many more. 
Also an arts scholar, Somi was a recent recipient of the Doris Duke Foundation’s French-American Jazz Exchange Composers’ Grant. She was also awarded the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation’s USArtists International Grant and was named a 2011 TED Global Fellow, an inaugural Association of Performing Arts Presenters Fellow, and is the founder of New Africa Live, a non-profit organization dedicated to celebrating the very best of contemporary African artists working in the performance, visual, and literary arts. 
Somi recently signed to Sony Music/Okeh Records and will release her major label debut in early 2014.

"Superb!"
-Vogue Magazine

"all elegance and awe…utterly captivating"
- Billboard

"the earthy gutsiness of Nina Simone blended with the vocal beauty of Dianne Reeves"
- JazzTimes

Somi - voice
Otis Brown III - drums
Liberty Ellman - guitar
Michael Olatuja - bass