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 Taking its name from a luscious fruit in Cuba also known as "mamey", "ZapOte" is an original female-fronted band that takes the listener and dancer into a zone where House, Funk, Afro-beat, Samba, Salsa and Jazz are right at home. ZapOte was founded and is lead by composer and singer/songwriter/instrumentalist Dawn Drake, a native of the Shenandoah Valley who has traveled and studied music in West Africa, Brazil, Cuba and New York. Dawn Drake's poetic lyrics and melodies are delivered with heartfelt vocals, and are joined with the irresistible grooves of latin percussion, funky bass, swinging hornlines and virtuosic improvisation.All the musicians in ZapOte bring an eclectic palate of musical experiences to the stage, promising to make you want to get up and dance. "Dawn Drake and her band ZapOte are at the beginnings of a fascinating journey to enthusiastically bridge chasms of cultural and gender disconnect that plagues so much of pop music's body politic.To hear them is to imagine early period jam sessions between Laura Nyro and Carole King with Sly Stone and Sergio Mendes sitting in.Theirs is a playfully intense dynamic that needs to be seen more" -Darrell McNeill, Director, Black Rock Coalition, Curator Brooklyn Academy of Music Cafe.
Visit the Dawn Drake ZapOte website
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