GRAMMY-nominated, Brooklyn-based and North Carolina-bred Becca Stevens has established an outstanding career for herself, blending and effortless vocal talent with exquisite compositions that draw inspiration from pop, jazz, indie-rock and traditional Appalachian folk music. Her most recent album, WONDERBLOOM (GroundUP ’20, which she produced and engineered with Nic Hard) displays Stevens’ skill of layering profound and discerning lyrics with funky and dance-ready beats in a record that Jazz Magazine described as “sophisticated and sensual pop” and The Mail on Sunday said is “Glamorous… semi-electric pop Prince might approve of.” The track “Slow Burn” from WONDERBLOOM was nominated for a GRAMMY for Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals in 2020.

 

Becca continues to push the boundaries of convention, with her music weaving together music from her youth with the expertise of jazz composition she's picked up from some of the greats. Along with her solo output, Becca is a highly-respected collaborator who has worked with the likes of David Crosby, Jacob Collier, Michael League (Snarky Puppy), Brad Mehldau, Chris Thile, Esperanza Spalding, Attacca Quartet, Laura Mvula, José James, Cory Wong, Vince Mendoza and Timo Andres. She refused to be labeled and continues to defy the notion of what a singer-songwriter should be. Instead, she dictates to the rest of what what we should (and should not) expect from artistry such as hers.

The Secret Trio is made up of three astounding musicians who came together to create a new type of chamber music, combining the elements of sound, texture and rhythm with new and interesting approaches to their instruments. Not bound to a single tradition, they perform a collection of original pieces and traditional melodies that fuses the microtonal modes and improvisation of the Middle East, dance beats of the Balkans, and elements of jazz, Rock, classical and world music. The delicate harmonies, rapid-fire synchrony and intricate counterpoint developed by a trio of musicians with separate roots in Turkish, Armenian and Macedonian Roma music is extraordinary. By inventing new ways to play percussively on fundamentally melodic instruments, the ensemble, full of rhythm and drive, harmony and counterpoint, never sounds like only three instruments. In that the energy of live music is essential to the ensemble's ideology, this recording was made without the use of any overdubs in order to capture the excitement of their live concerts.