About Me
Claude Gomis hails from Dakar, Senegal, West Africa and currently resides in Brooklyn. He makes a living as a musician, painter, sculptor and producer.
His love of music and art began early on, when he would go to concerts with his father, Rudy Gomis of Orchestra Baobab. He often joined them onstage singing, playing the cowbell or dancing.
As a teenager, he studied sculpture while attending art school and under the tutelage of Djibi N'diaye. Claude's first big project was working with Positive Black Soul, painting backdrops of their show sets. He also created stadium-sized concert backdrops for Youssou N'dour, under Assane Sa.
Claude's devotion to music and the visual arts sent him around the globe until he landed in America. He has played shows with Midnite, a reggae band from St. Croix, as well as the Brazooka Band, Les Souci, Junior Jazz, Sadao Watanabe and others. He crosses many musical genres, including Jazz, Reggae, Samba, the Blues and Bluegrass.
Upon moving from Washington to NYC, he began playing the club and studio circuit. He started a band called Asiko Brothers, in which he served as singer and percussionist. An offspring of this band was the Asiko Drum Convention, which had 15 members and played more traditional music.
When Fela Kuti died, Claude was the lone percussionist who played at Summerstage.
Claude then helped spur the trend of playing percussion alongside trendy club music, which he has done at places such as the Tunnel, Serafina, the Plumm, P.M., Lotus, Bembe and Joe's Pub.
Claude writes songs, sings and plays percussion in the Mud Band, an amalgam of funky musicians that includes African and Latin percussionists, horn players, jazz vocalists, and a turntablist.
He still paints regularly, now selling his art from his atelier. Highly prolific, and never diverting his attention away from both the visual arts and music, Claude is a passionate and intense professional artist.
He has released two full-length cds independently.
CLAUDE'S NEW FULL LENGTH CD - SEEDS OF BAOBAB WAS RELEASED IN STORES NATIONWIDE ON OCTOBER 23RD. ORDER YOUR COPY NOW ON amazon.com
A special thanks to all of the musicians involved!
Dehran Duckworth, Peter Fand, Raphael Torn, Francky Moulet, Jojo Kuo, Tony Cedras, Magama Skosana, Herve Samb, Famoro Diabate, Bailo Ba, Jenell James, Ibrahima Sek, Shlomi Cohen, Rufus Cappadocia, Rudy Gomis, Frederic Doumbe, Toyia Taylor, Mike Irwin, Nawaz Dogah, Omar Diou, Francis Mbappe, Kaissa Doumbe, Rachael Hollingsworth, Joel Turken, Franck Mantegar, Jean Claude, Matthieu Lasserre, Thioko Diagne.
For more info on Claude Gomis please check out Claude's Website
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