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On September 14th, 2012, Natalia Zukerman took the stage at SPACE in Evanston, IL alongside a lifetime’s worth of collaborators and an arsenal of instruments.  Over the following 2 hours, the room swelled with chemistry and charisma as some of the finest singer/songwriters and musicians in today’s scene came together for the live recording of Natalia’s latest record  Gypsies & Clowns: Natalia Zukerman and Friends Live at SPACE.

“a celebration of musical community…
alluring and impossible to resist.”

- Seth Rogovoy, author, Bob Dylan: Prophet Mystic Poet

 

Natalia says that for her “collaboration is a conversation – the most intimate give and take that is as much about the notes you play as the notes you don’t. Over time, I have come to enjoy and crave this conversation. Luckily, I have found the tribe of people who collaborate in the same way, from the same place.”

“These are all the most giving and gracious players. Everyone has huge ears, which I believe is a result of having huge hearts,” Natalia says of her special guests AG, Edie Carey, Trina Hamlin, Anne Heaton, Erin McKeown, Willy Porter, Garrison Starr, Mona Tavakoli, and Susan Werner. “All of these musicians listen with such intensity. And I think we all share the belief that you don’t want to be the loudest person at the party just to be seen. They all choose their moments and the conversation is able to unfold with ease”.

“The musicians on this record are some of the most important musical collaborators in my life. I have watched and learned so much from all of them. The crew that gathered that night were some of the most influential on me as a musician. It was such a gift to get to celebrate with them!”

 

Official Music Video for “Gas Station Roses”


Recent News

Paste Magazine – 24 Musicians Share Their Paintings

Posted on September 4th 2012

New York singer/songwriter Natalia Zukerman has released five albums. As accomplished an artist as she is a musician, she included original paintings in some preordered copies of her latest, Gas Station Roses.

When did you first start painting?
I was terribly dyslexic as a kid and couldn’t read (books or music) until a pretty late age. I learned to play music by ear, and I learned to write by copying the images I saw. Over and over and over again. The capital letters B and E, the numbers 3 and 4, they became almost abstract shapes, my pencil tracing the lines that were written out for me until I could replicate them on my own.

We had an assignment in 4th or 5th grade that had something to do with Egyptians, and I ended up copying a wall painting from a Pharaoh’s tomb. I copied exactly the image that I saw, taking what I’d learned from my reading and writing lessons (brain re-organizing!) and applying it to these forms—bodies, clothes, instruments, colors, lines and shadow took shape on the page. It was my first painting and I still have it- framed and in a storage box…somewhere!

Are you inspired by a particular painter or artistic movement?
My grandmother (my mom’s mom) was a painter and ceramist. I loved visiting my grandparents and playing with clay in the basement of their house. In high school, I loved painters like John Singer Sargent, Andrew Wyeth and of course I had a poster of a Dali painting and an Escher print in my room. Later, I discovered Jenny Saville and her exploration of the female form blew my mind. But it wasn’t until college that I discovered what moves me the most—a guest speaker came to my art history class to talk about the Chicano Mural Art Movement. I learned about Los Tres Grandes—Rivera, Orozco and Siqueiros and their influence on the mural-art movement in California, Chicago, Philadelphia and New York. I started studying the women muralists in California like Judith Baca, Susan Cervantes and others. I read and looked at everything I could find and decided I’d move to San Francisco after college to paint murals. And I did! It took me a while though—I was a mural tour guide first through Precita Eyes and then started volunteering on community art projects before starting my own mural company, Off The Wall. It’s the community art process that still excites and inspires me most—its ability to tell a story, to ignite activism and to bring together groups of people to create long-lasting, meaningful and beautiful works of art.

How does painting differ from music as a creative outlet for you?
I’m actually beginning to see these two disciplines as coming from the same place. My friend Andy Friedman (musician and incredible illustrator/cartoonist for publications like The New Yorker and Time) once described creativity to me by saying that it’s like water coming out of a hole. If you put your finger in it, you can manipulate it and make it come out sideways—slower, faster, up, down. But it’s always the same water. In other words, whether “it” is coming out as a mural, a painting on canvas, a song, or a piece of wooden jewelry, it’s coming from the same place, the same well. Both require a lot of work, practice, attention. When I’ve spent too long a stretch on music, my brushes start screaming at me and vice versa- when I’m spending too much time in my studio, my guitar looks so lonely. And mad! So they’re not that different—needy, rewarding, expansive, maddening and freeing all at the same time.

Where can we see your work in person?
My most recent murals are in restaurants in Brooklyn—Villa Pancho Taqueria at 1047 Bedford Avenue; Back 9 Grill at 635 Vanderbilt Ave.; Zaytoons at 472 Myrtle Avenue. Other murals: People’s History of Telegraph Avenue (Telegraph and Haste, Berkeley, Calif.); Planet Rainbow (Rainbow School, Oakland, Calif.), Alice on the Wall (Chambers Street, New York); Yellow Metrobus and Una Pequena Historia de Nuestros Mundos (Havana, Cuba), Tiny Teeth (Phoenix, AZ). I’m also designing necklaces for Bergevin-Lane Vineyards in Walla Walla, Wash., and they’re available in the winery and storefront. They’re hand-painted miniatures on reclaimed guitar wood. I’m also currently at work on commissioned paintings based on song lyrics.

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“Art Is Song” Tour with Adrianne Gonzalez

Posted on June 14th 2011

Two videos about the project…



From the Blog

Art Is You, Calling All Crows and a free download

Posted on July 11th 2011

Hi everyone!

I’m writing to you from Savannah, GA. Just finished the first few shows with Adrianne Gonzalez on what we’re calling our Art is Song Tour. It’s been an incredible journey so far sharing our paintings based on our songs with you!

Check out an amazing video our friend Bryan Mir made for us (Bryan can also be heard playing bass on Brand New Frame and Gas Station Roses):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1gTm9rpd80

We’ve started a really fun offshoot of Art is Song at our shows. We’ve printed out lyrics we used in our paintings and had people pose with them. The results have been so gorgeous that is became a new project we’re calling Art is You! If you can make it to a show, please come pose for a photo. At some point, we’ll have all of them online to view. We’ll also have an online store set up soon so you can see and buy all our prints and paintings!

In addition to all our paintings, Adrianne and I also recorded an EP called “Dust and Stars” that is available only at these shows. To thank you for all your support we want to give you a song to download for free from the EP. It’s a song we wrote together called “Flesh and Bone.” We hope you enjoy it!

Here’s the link to download the song:
http://bit.ly/pbL2aT

In other news, I’m thrilled to announce I’ll be playing bass with Susan Werner at two festivals this month. The incredible Gail Ann Dorsey, who has been playing bass with Susan regularly, is now on tour with Lenny Kravitz. Congratulations to Gail Ann! We wish her all the best and I’m so honored to fill for her for a few dates this summer and into the fall. Check my website for tour dates with Art is Song, Susan Werner and more!

And one last important bit of news:

Adrianne and I are really excited to be working with a great organization called Calling All Crows. At all of our shows, we are collecting donations as part of CAC’s program called Bringing Change to Women. Your change will help bring shelter and learning opportunities to Afghan women in need. We also created a painting that is being auctioned off for a few more days on eBay. Go check it out and place a bid!

http://bit.ly/qlwad4




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Upcoming shows RECENT PRESS

"Natalia's voice could send an orchid into bloom while her guitar playing can open a beer bottle with its teeth." – New Yorker

"a strutting brass band one minute, a sighing lover the next." – The Boston Globe

"a wise mix of rootsy styles from torch blues to country swing. If you're a fan of Madeleine Peyroux, Bonnie Raitt or even Amy Winehouse, you'll find stuff to connect with here." – Philadelphia Daily News

“an example of the finest Americana” – WUMB

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