Jupiter & Okwess to Carry out at Opus 40

In addition to being a historic and exquisite sculpture web site, Opus 40 simply could be the very best small outside efficiency venue in the whole Hudson Valley, no less than by way of its impressed, high quality programming. The most recent instance of this: Congolese band Jupiter & Okwess, which is able to play on the arts heart on August 3.

Led by vocalist Jupiter Bokondji, the group was fashioned in 1990 and swept the continent with their fusion of funk, rock, and Afropop that pulls from soukous, rumba, cavacha, kwassa kwassa, madiaba, and different kinds. The civil warfare that ravaged the Democratic Republic of Congo from 1996 to 1997 noticed a number of of the band’s members flee to Europe to flee the violence and conscription, however Bokondji, who descends from a household of griots and spent his adolescence in Berlin, selected to stay in his beginning metropolis of Kinshasa in the course of the battle. He calls his band’s sound “Bofenia Rock.”

A 2006 documentary about Bokondji’s life and music, Jupiter’s Dance, introduced the reunited Okwess worldwide consideration and excursions in Europe, North America, and South America amid collaborations with Damon Albarn (Blur, Gorillaz).

Jupiter & Okwess will carry out at Opus 40 in Saugerties on August 3 at 7pm. Tickets are $25.