Biography
At first glance, the very idea of a blues band without a guitar player strikes the mind as a daring if not totally outrageous concept. But, Davina & the Vagabonds, a Minneapolis-based quintet driven by New Orleans horns and the campy purr of vocalist/pianist Davina Sowers, carry it off with such aplomb that you won’t miss the usual six-string histrionics one bit.
Sowers grew up in Altoona, an industrial town in western Pennsylvania. Her mother was a folk singer whose fourth husband (Davina’s adoptive father), introduced her to old blues and jazz recordings that he played on his vintage Victrola phonograph. “The rasp and the tonal quality put a twisted edge on those standards,” she says of the sound and style of music that became so ingrained in her that you can hear its rustic authenticity in every song that she sings or records.
A free spirit with a BA in music, Sowers, 30, is a classically trained pianist with years of experience both performing and teaching piano. In contrast, she was also a busker who played the guitar on street corners for tourist tips in Key West, Florida.
It was in Key West that Sowers met her husband and bass player Michael Carvale (formerly with the Lamont Cranston Blues Band) and Carvale that caused her to move from the sand and palms of Florida to the snow and spruce of Minnesota in February of 2005.
Inspired by the vibrant Twin City music scene, Sowers, who has been called “the hardest working blues woman in frigid Minnesota,” recently quit her waitress job at Applebee’s to focus on fronting her first group, the Vagabonds. She can’t praise them enough. “This band is genre busting,” she declares. “Such creative energy, we are like a family.” They were enormously popular at the last three Bayfront Blues Festivals in Duluth, Minnesota and represented the Greater Twin Cities Blues Music Society at the 25th annual International Blues Challenge in Memphis, Tennessee this past February.
Listening to Davina & the Vagabonds is like stepping into a wondrous musical time machine. They have the panache and superlative musicianship to recreate the retro sound and ageless appeal of golden age Americana in high-definition reality on stage for your immense pleasure and enjoyment.
Davina has already shared the stage with Little Feat, Buddy Guy, Elvin Bishop, The Lamont Cranston Band, The Blues Brothers, Joe Bonamassa, Irma Thomas and James Hunter, among others, at venues such as House of Blues in Atlantic City, NJ and the Bayfront Blues Festival in Duluth, MN.
John Hammer of Blue Monday describes them perfectly. “Davina & the Vagabonds play a hot jazz-blues-cabaret-soul-lounge-rock that warms the soul and just plain makes you want to dance,” Not even a rabid but open-minded fan of blues guitar could ask for more.
QUOTES
"At first glance, the very idea of a blues band without a guitar player strikes the mind as a daring if not totally outrageous concept. But, Davina & the Vagabonds, a Minneapolis-based quintet driven by New Orleans horns and the campy purr of vocalist/pianist Davina Sowers, carry it off with such aplomb that you won’t miss the usual six-string histrionics one bit.Listening to Davina & the Vagabonds is like stepping into a wondrous musical time machine. They have the panache and superlative musicianship to recreate the retro sound and ageless appeal of golden age Americana in high-definition reality on stage for your immense pleasure and enjoyment."
-Ken Wright, Thunderbay Blues Festival
"Hardest -wroking Blues woman in Minnesota, but......two things remain consistent at all her shows, though: her throaty but cushiony voice, which has a sort of hard-mattress comfort to it that's part Bonnie Raitt, Etta James and a little Amy Winehouse, and her band's rollicking New Orleans flavor, driven home by dueling horn players and a bayou-thick standup bass”
-CHRIS RIEMENSCHNEIDER, Star Tribune
"At first listen to Davina and the Vagabonds, you imagine the tones escaping from a 300-pound blues musician. It seems unlikely that much power is coming from the slight frame of one Ms. Davina. It sounds like an unnatural force, pulled from some secret spot in the belly no other singer has yet discovered. It's a low bellow, most closely aligned with Amy Winehouse's walloping alto. But Davina takes "retro" back further than Winehouse and her Phil Spector reminiscing. She beckons an age when bad girls wore red lipstick and pin curls. Her music may be adorned with exceptional groaning trumpets, rat-a-tatting drum rolls, and staccato piano lines, but nothing deserves the complementing position to her voice. She’s in a league of her own."
-Erin Roof - City Pages 2009
"Davina and The Vagabonds are based out of the Twin Cities and play hot jazz-blues-cabaret-soul-lounge-rock that warms the soul an just plain makes ya wanna dance."
-John Hammer,Blue Monday
"When I listen to her sing all I can say is “Fun, fun, fun”.
-Diana Skope – Skope Entertainment
Instrumentation
Davina Sowers - PIANO VOCALS
Michael Carvale - UPRIGHT BASS
Dan Olson - DRUMS
Scott Agster - TROMBONE
Zack Lozier - TRUMPET
Discography
2006- Songs From Thomas Ave.
2007- Under Lock and Key
2008- Live at The Times
Links
| http://www.davinaandthevagabonds.com |
| WEBSITE |
| Myspace |
| Davina's Blog |