Frédéric Yonnet performed with Sore Losers at Trees Night Club in Dallas, Texas on Saturday, Feb 4th as part of release of their new CD, We Are Sore Losers. Don’t get it twisted, these brothers are anything but losers.  In fact, they are real winners!  They take their name from the notion that they hate to lose much they only focused on winning (not akin to the Charlie Sheen’s version of winning).

Read the piece from the Dallas Observer for the full story.

This “experimental” hip hop group brings forth a fresh wave of music for your ears. Dallas, Texas made, Sore Losers (We Are Sore Losers) are a breath of fresh air to the music and entertainment industry. Composed of 6 members, Vince “Encyclopedia” Brown, K Cooks, Sir Tim, Jordan Hughes, King Robinson Jr., and Matt “Big Kuntry” Curtis; Sore Losers, take the experimental approach towards music, combining hip hop elements with an alternative vibe. Inspired by artists such as Nas, MGMT, Lupe Fiasco, N.E.R.D., Foo Fighters and Gnarls Barkley, Sore Losers have created a sound that is different than any other artist, band or group in the world of rap.

While a harmonica is organic to the group, they put it back in the box when the option of including Yonnet on the project was realized. “I love the fact that the harmonica sound was already in their consciousness and that they give it so much space”, said Yonnet, “If being apart of their project turns a new audience on the the possibilities of the instrument, I’m down with it!”  Yonnet is featured on the track “If I Were Rich”.

Also on the ticket were Marty & Shaud, The Boombachs , Zawcain (BET MUSIC MATTERS), and Fly Union, a HipHop crew out of Columbus, Ohio featuring Monkey Wrench and Jerreau.

(Washington, DC January 24, 2010)

Every year music critics complain about who made or didn’t make the list.  However, this year’s slate appears much more diverse.  The inclusions of rapper Fat Trel, experimental-pop act Bluebrain, Mariachi Los Amigos, eclectic indie label Sockets Records as well as Oddisee, Zenizia Allstar, Orquesta La Leyenda, The Caribbean, Deleted Scenes, Kid Congo Powers, and Edie Sedgwick are more reflective of the 2011 DC music scene.

Only dues-paying members of WAMA can vote so if you’re a member and want to show some love, vote Yonnet in both categories.  If your not a member, you have until Feb 5th to register and mark your ballots.

The Award show is Sunday, February 19th at the State Theater. For more info, visit www.wama.com.

Throughout the day Yonnet, along with several other Seydel endorsees – Ross Garren, Just Dave and John Schaman, MD – demonstrated their technique on the products while C.A. Seyel president Lars Seifert, U.S. President Rupert Oysler and sales manager Os Leguizamo took sales orders. When not demonstrating, Yonnet made his way through the various halls with the intent to check out the latest gear.  “It was really hard to got 10-feet without running into a musician that you knew or one that you wanted to know,” said Yonnet.

Stevie Wonder jokes with Yonnet to "get on the bus" as they make the rounds at NAMM.

While talking with representatives from a studio microphone manufacturer, Yonnet turned to see a huge crowd moving in his direction.  Leading the pack was none other than Stevie Wonder.  Yonnet approached, said “Bonjour” and the next thing he knew, he was apart of the entourage. Wonder wanted Yonnet to introduce him to the Seydel line of harmonicas so, after a few stops — which included Samson, Suzuki, and Moog, they headed the Seydel.  Wonder samples three harmonicas and settled on The Saxony, a chromatic with stainless steel reeds.

As if the exhibitions didn’t offer enough music during the day, almost every hotel and club in the area was booked with live music at night.  On Friday night, Yonnet checked out the Bass Bash hosted by Nate Watts — bassist for Stevie Wonder. As Stevie Wonder sat in the audience, Yonnet was called up on stage where he “ripped” a solo on “Superstition.”  Afterwards, Yonnet accompanied Wonder to Mike Phillips show hosted by Hidden Beach Records.

Special thanks to Shure microphones, T C Electronic and Peavey for loaning Seydel and Yonnet equipment for the booth.

Celebrity sightings included: Tommy Lee, George Benson, Stevie Wonder, Donovan, Greyson Chance, Greg Grunberg, Scott Grimes, Bob Guiney, Chuck Lowery, Tinsel Korey, David Crosby, Shaun Barrowes, Maya, Joel and Benj Madden, Jackson Brown, Alan Parsons, Bob Weir, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Baby Face, Navarone Garibaldi, Jay Gordon, John Stamos, Ken and Colbie Caillat, Dan Jacobson, Amber Frakes, Stokley Williams, Bootsy Collins, Peter Escovedo,  Sheila E and Cameron Mitchell.

Photo credit: C. Sims

Throughout the day Yonnet, along with several other Seydel endorsees – Ross Garren, Just Dave and John Schaman, MD – demonstrated their technique on the products while C.A. Seyel president Lars Seifert, U.S. President Rupert Oysler and sales manager Os Leguizamo took sales orders. When not demonstrating, Yonnet made his way through the various halls with the intent to check out the latest gear.  “It was really hard to got 10-feet without running into a musician that you knew or one that you wanted to know,” said Yonnet.

Stevie Wonder jokes with Yonnet to "get on the bus" as they make the rounds at NAMM.

While talking with representatives from a studio microphone manufacturer, Yonnet turned to see a huge crowd moving in his direction.  Leading the pack was none other than Stevie Wonder.  Yonnet approached, said “Bonjour” and the next thing he knew, he was apart of the entourage. Wonder wanted Yonnet to introduce him to the Seydel line of harmonicas so, after a few stops — which included Samson, Suzuki, and Moog, they headed the Seydel.  Wonder samples three harmonicas and settled on The Saxony, a chromatic with stainless steel reeds.

As if the exhibitions didn’t offer enough music during the day, almost every hotel and club in the area was booked with live music at night.  On Friday night, Yonnet checked out the Bass Bash hosted by Nate Watts — bassist for Stevie Wonder. As Stevie Wonder sat in the audience, Yonnet was called up on stage where he “ripped” a solo on “Superstition.”  Afterwards, Yonnet accompanied Wonder to Mike Phillips show hosted by Hidden Beach Records.

Special thanks to Shure microphones, T C Electronic and Peavey for loaning Seydel and Yonnet equipment for the booth.

Celebrity sightings included: Tommy Lee, George Benson, Stevie Wonder, Donovan, Greyson Chance, Greg Grunberg, Scott Grimes, Bob Guiney, Chuck Lowery, Tinsel Korey, David Crosby, Shaun Barrowes, Maya, Joel and Benj Madden, Jackson Brown, Alan Parsons, Bob Weir, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Baby Face, Navarone Garibaldi, Jay Gordon, John Stamos, Ken and Colbie Caillat, Dan Jacobson, Amber Frakes, Stokley Williams, Bootsy Collins, Peter Escovedo,  Sheila E and Cameron Mitchell.

Photo credit: C. Sims

[Washington, January 13, 2012]

A Washington Post article dated Jan 16, 2012, mentioned Wonder’s “spotting” however, their reference to an “impromptu performance” by Wonder and Yonnet at the BET Honors Pre-Dinner was actually a duet with violinist Chelsey Greene. When Wonder heard the first harmonica note, he recognized Yonnet’s sound and, upon exiting the BET dinner, he alerted his security that he wanted to go to Blues Alley to hear more.

Hundreds of family, friends, political figures, media personalities and generations of communications executives turned out to celebrate the life of Ofield Dukes.  CNN Political Commentator Jamal Simmons and ABC 7 news anchor Maureen Bunyan served as masters of ceremonies. There were over 18 speakers. including DC Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, DC Mayor Vincent C. Gray, former DC Mayors Sharon Pratt and Marion Barry and former Secretary of Labor, Alexis M. Herman (pictured right).  Reverend Dr. Wallace Charles Smith, Senior Minister, Shiloh Baptist Church, presided.

Dukes died of bone cancer on Dec. 7, 2011 at the age of 79 in his hometown of Detroit.

Audience members were visibly moved and uplifted by Yonnet’s rendition of “Amazing Grace”.  Former wife Dr. Rosa Trapp Dail, told Yonnet “stirred my soul and that when Yonnet when to another place musically, I went with you”.  Virginia Williams, mother of former mayor Anthony Williams approached Yonnet after the service and said she only cried twice during the memorial and the second time was while listening to Yonnet.  Read more about Dukes and his contribution to the public relations society and the country.

After working in the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson, Dukes opened his public relations agency in the National Press Building in 1969, with Motown Records as his first client.

Dukes came to Washington in l964 to work in the Johnson-Humphrey Administration as Deputy Director of the President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, chaired by former President Lyndon B. Johnson. A year later, he was appointed to the staff of Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey. Dukes had become a gate keeper for African American reporters needing access to the White House for every Democratic administration since LBJ.

In l969, Dukes opened his public relations firm in the National Press Building, with Motown his first client. Leading to the launch of his independent practice, he consulted with every Democratic presidential candidate since 1968, organized the first dinner of the Congressional Black Caucus in 1972, and counted Coretta Scott King, Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, Rep. Charles B. Rangel, D-N.Y., “Roots” author Alex Haley and boxing promoter Don King among his clients. Dukes was among the first African-American members of the Democratic National Committee‘s finance committee.

As the major link to Black leadership, Dukes leveraged his  political connections and his Washington influence to became one of the country’s leading African-American public-relations professionals. In 1981, he worked closely with Stevie Wonder to generate support for the Civil Rights movement and a national holiday for Martin Luther King Jr’s birthday.  Dukes also had a key role in planning a march on Washington that helped lead to King’s birthday being declared a national holiday. Three decades later, Dukes witnesses the unveiling of the King memorial on the National Mall.

Dukes was a founding member of the Black Public Relations Society of Washington in 1993. Many of his former colleagues were in the pews on Friday.

“Ofield was both a communications guru and someone who believed in equal opportunity for all,” DNC official Donna Brazile said Friday. “He was an adviser, a mentor, but most of all a writer who believed that we must all tell our story and tell it again and again.”

At his company’s peak, in the late 1970s, Dukes had more than a dozen employees and annual billings of more than $1million.

At his company’s peak, Dukes had more than a dozen employees  and annual billings of more than $1 million. He also had big-name clients like Anheuser-Busch, CBS Records, AT&T,  the National Bankers Association, the National Education Association and the Treasury Department. He represented several foreign countries, including Ghana and Liberia; participated in international trade missions; and helped rally opposition to the apartheid regime of South Africa.

In 2002, Cathy Hughes, founder of Radio One, named three Detroit station buildings the Ofield Dukes Communications Center because of his service to the black community and black press.

Read more stories about Ofield Dukes:

• The Washington Post by Hamil R. Harris
• USA Today by By Matt Schudel, Washington Post
• The History Makers
• Black America Web Little-Known Black History Fact: Ofield Dukes
• Jet (First Marriage after 40; page 29)
• Ebony (First-Time Father After 50; page 56)

“Harmonicist  Frédéric Yonnet joined the orchestra for a moving rendering of the spiritual “O Freedom,” accompanied by a stirring reading by Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton,” wrote the Examiner.  Who would have thought we would see the day that a symphony orchestra, let alone, the National Symphony Orchestra welcome a concert that featured a harmonicist, soulful gospel soloists and choir:  joined together seamlessly by words of a congresswoman? Yonnet was also featured in ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’ and an “Ellington Freedom Medley”.

Below is a concert review written by Patric McCoy of Examiner.com.

A Mighty Stream: Music in tribute to MLK flows from NSO in DC at THEARC

.

ARTS EXPLAINED
by Erin Williams

Harmonica player Frederic Yonnet has been making music since he was a teen, and his talents have led him to work with artists such as Erykah Badu, Anthony Hamilton and Stevie Wonder. On Saturday, he’ll play at THEARC as part of “A Mighty Stream,” a celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. that includes the National Symphony Orchestra and recording artists Shirley Murdock and Byron Nichols. Here, Yonnet discusses how his instrument can do more than the rest.

Also, read ARTIST EXPLAINED where Yonnet talks about Erykah Badu’s eye for the harmonica.

“My cousin on my father’s side gave me a harmonica for Christmas, and then I lost it. I had to find another one, and I discovered that there were so many different harmonicas. I started to do that crazy journey about finding the right instrument for the sound I had in my head. I really, really liked the fact that it fits in your pocket. It’s inexpensive — if you lose it, you can just buy another one and start over. And the lifetime of a harmonica is rather short, anyway. When you play it a lot, it will break on you, so you can’t really become attached to it like you will with a saxophone or a more expensive instrument. It’s convenient . . . people really like the idea of that little pocket friend.

“There’s one way to play the harmonica that is very basic and will give you some pretty fast rewards. If you play it in music that the musical structure is rather simple to access — like a blues song or a country song, bluegrass or a folk tune — you can just grab the harmonica and play three holes, and you will be in the key of the song, and you feel like you’re doing something. That’s what 99 percent of the harmonica players out there are doing on the diatonic harmonica, which is the one I’m playing. And then there’s this almost scientific group of nerds who have decided to just find the limits and expand them . . . which really [is] in the mind of the player more than in the instrument. It’s about expanding the limitations.

“I have learned [from Stevie Wonder] that an instrument doesn’t have to sound the way 99 percent of the people make it sound like. Stevie plays a harmonica called a chromatic harmonica, which is a harmonica that has two harmonicas built in one body. It has a harmonica in the key of C and another one in the key of C sharp.

“My instrument only has 19 notes on three octaves, so to create all the missing notes, I have to bend them. I have to artificially create those notes. It’s almost like playing a violin: When you look at the neck of the violin, there’s no frets on the neck, and you have to be extremely precise in the way you position your fingers. That would be the equivalent of what I’m doing.

“I definitely hope to expand the way that people think about the harmonica. Within that message, I hope that people will extend the way they think about things that seem to be limited in general. Because once again, the limitations are not in the instruments; they are not in the tools we are using. They are definitely in the minds. [With] politics around the world in such a conflicted state, we definitely need to be reminded of that. There’s always a solution, and it’s not only in somebody’s agenda. We should definitely keep our minds open. And if you don’t find the solution to a problem, you are part of the problem.”

NSO & NEWorks: A Mighty Stream

Yonnet will perform at 5 p.m. Saturday at THEARC Theater,
1901 Mississippi Ave. SE, the District. Adults, $15; children younger than 12, $10; seniors, $12.

Artist, Explained: Frédéric Yonnet

By Erin Williams  |  04:59 PM ET, 12/29/2011

French harmonica player Frédéric Yonnet has performed with musicians including Stevie Wonder and Prince — but when it comes to teaching neo-soul singer Erykah Badua thing or two, the D.C.-based music man says it can’t be done. “Oh, you can’t school Erykah Badu! She’s definitely an artist on her own.”

Yonnet, who is set to play at the Martin Luther King Jr. celebration “A Mighty Stream,” presented by the NSO and NEWorks Productions on Jan. 7 at THEARC in Anacostia, talked with ArtsPost about performing with Badu at the 9th annual African American Cross-Cultural Works Blues and Jazz Festival in 2006.

Click here to view the embedded video.

“There’s this video where we basically play the harmonica together. It was totally spontaneous — I was totally surprised,” Yonnet said.

“On the video I was actually using two harmonicas because one of them was starting to act a little shaky. There was a stool standing behind Erykah and I. I switched [my] harmonica for a fresh one and put the broken one on the stool behind me. She turned around — she had a tambourine in her hand — she turned around, and put the tambourine down and grabbed the broken harmonica. So talking about schooling, she totally surprised me on this one. I had no idea that she actually could play! So she grabbed the harmonica and we had that spontaneous jam in the moment.”

Anthony Hamilton

Hamilton, who co-wrote all the songs on the project, attracted an impressive array of producers and production teams including the legendary Babyface – who produced three of the tracks including Mad.  James Poyser (the Roots; Erykah Badu), Jerry Wonda Duplessis (the Fugees, Wyclef Jean) and Salaam Remi (the Fugees; Nas; Amy Winehouse). Collectively, they take “Back to Love” forward with both retro styling and contemporary beats.

Read the LA Times Album Review written by Ernest Hardy.

Yonnet says when he initially met Hamilton back in 2006, he teased him about the “keyboard” harmonica sound on the album “Soulife”.  “I asked, ‘how are you gonna use a fake harmonica on such soulful music?’ Hamilton explained that they were rushed to finish the album but he vowed to connect on a future project. Mad seemed appropriate.

So why is Anthony so mad?

Music sample

Mad Lyrics:

I’m mad at the way she loves me.
And I’m mad at the way she cares.
I’m mad at the way she touch me.
At the way that she comb her hair.

I’d be lying, if I said it didn’t mean a thing.
I’d be lying, if I said I didn’t care.
I’d be lying, if I said I didn’t love her.
I’m still here. I’m still here.

I’m mad at the way she loves me.
I”m mad at the time we spent.
I’m mad about our conversation.
Damn, I’m mad about everything.

I’d be lying, if I said it didn’t mean a thing.
I’d be lying, if I said I didn’t care.
I’d be lying, if I said it didn’t mean a thing.
I’m still here. I’m still here.

And I’m made about the way she loves me.
And I’m mad at my next of kin.
And I’m mad about the Sunday dinners.
And I’m mad that they count me in.

I’d be lying, if I said it didn’t mean a thing.
I’d be lying, if I said I didn’t care.
I’d be lying, if I said it didn’t mean a thing.
‘m still here. I’m still here.

I ain’t never gonna leave.