Petite Woman

Petite Afrique, the new album from superb jazz chanteuse Somi, is a song cycle inspired by the vibrant African immigrant community that has become a vital part of Harlem s cultural dimension and to New York City as a whole. The historic uptown neighborhood fondly boasts of West 116th Street as "Little Africa," where passersby can find any number of African immigrant shops selling a vast array of products and food. Over the last decade, gentrification has crept deeper into Harlem, pushing the African immigrants out. With Petite Afrique, Somi ensures that the stories and struggles of New York City's largest African community do not disappear without having ever been told. The songs on the album are based on Somi's conversations with diverse members of the Harlem community reflecting on themes of transnationalism, cultural difference, assimilation and gentrification. Blending modern jazz, African music and the singer-songwriter tradition, Petite Afrique is an amalgamation of the musical and cultural worlds that resonate with Somi as an African AND American woman and a proud Harlemite.

One of the giants of the historically informed performance world needs little introduction; nor indeed his sympathy to Mozart’s oeuvre as already demonstrated in recordings of the three da Ponte operas that have met with wide acclaim and many awards for their closely observed intimacy, their sense of fun and drama and their well-chosen casts, at one with Kuijken’s vision of these jewels of human and music drama.