EPK - Press Kit
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Biography:
It's probably a good thing Carlos wasn't there when the harmonica
appeared in North America in the 1860s. Neil Young and Bob Dylan can
probably roll with it when he says they are very mediocre harmonica
players. Aspiring harmonica players Wyatt Earp and Billy the Kid
might have overreacted and pulled out their pistols...
To say that del Junco just plays the harmonica would be like saying
Jimi Hendrix was just a guitar player. He blows the blues harp
through a prism -- suddenly it seems he's holding every color in the
musical rainbow right there in his hands.
Simultaneously sophisticated and raw, his playing blurs the
boundaries between blues and jazz (hence the name for his band “The
Blues Mongrels”). The emphasis is on blues, but Carlos and his band
are not afraid to merrily traipse off in other directions delivering
a seamless fusion of New Orleans second line grooves, swing, Latin,
ska melodies, to swampy roots rock.
Born in Havana, Cuba, del Junco (loosely translated "of the reeds")
immigrated with his family at the age of one. He bent his first note
on a harmonica when he was fourteen, making his debut with his high
school math teacher at a student talent night. In his early 20's del
Junco was immersed in a visual arts career; he graduated with
honours from a four year programme, majoring in sculpture at the Ontario College of Art. Sculpture has
definitely had an influence on his outlook on music: "Music is just
a different way of creating textures and shapes."
Playing a ten hole diatonic harmonica, Carlos has developed the
unique ability to play chromatically by using a recently developed
"overblow" technique taught to him by jazz virtuoso Howard Levy.
Overall, this approach to the diatonic harmonica, although much more
difficult to achieve, is in many ways more expressive and
communicative than the mechanized tone produced by the chromatic
harmonica . Carlos is one of the few pioneers of this overblow
method, bringing musical credibility to what has still been
considered by many in the music industry - a fringe folk
instrument. The sophisticated sound produced by del Junco is
both soulful and sensitive while never forgetting the rawness
inherent in blues music.