Dawn Drake & ZapOte

Expect Original and classic salsa, samba and Afro-beat from a Fierce female fronted band that was made to make you dance. There will be percussion galore, savory tunes filled with fun and conscious lyrics, impressive hornlines, deep bass and heartfelt vocals.
You may want to add Live Dancers(Salsa, Samba, Rumba, Latin) for your party to animate and involve the crowd and give a spectacular visual and sensory experience for your guests.
Check out our guest appearance on Fox 8 News Cleveland Here!:
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Dawn Drake & "ZapOte"
Fierce Global Dance band that spins you around the world of Latin, Funk, Afro-beat, Reggae and Brazilian grooves and moves

Taking its name from a luscious fruit in Cuba also known as "mamey",
"ZapOte" is an original Funk Latin Afro-Beat band lead by Dawn Drake, the Slovenian-American female bassist/conguera/singer/songwriter and composer, who manages to wear several hats while setting the scene with her own brand of cool. Her original music takes the listener and dancer into a zone where House, Funk, Afro-beat, Samba, Afro-Cuban rhythms and Jazz are
right at home. Her poetic lyrics spread messages of universal consciousness, delivered with heartfelt vocals, and are joined with the irresistible grooves of Latin percussion,
funky bass, swinging horn lines and improvisation.

PRESS:
"This saucy debut by soul sistah Dawn Drake is an incredible gift to the world of world music! She skillfully weaves together her bold poetic lyrics, melodic vocals, and a fusion of danceable rhythms performed by herself and a very talented band of musicianados. You'll love the horns, the deep bass, the compelling percussion..."
Luis Da Silva, Jules Bistro, NYC

"Dawn Drake and her band ZapOte are at the beginnings
of a fascinating journey to enthusiastically bridge
chasms of cultural and gender disconnect that plagues
so much of pop music's body politic.
To hear them is to imagine early period jam sessions
between Laura Nyro and Carole King with Sly Stone
and Sergio Mendes sitting in.
Theirs is a playfully intense dynamic that needs to be
seen more"-Darrell McNeill, Director, Black Rock
Coalition, Curator Brooklyn Academy of Music Cafe

BIOGRAPHY
About Dawn Drake and ZapOte:
This band has gone far and wide for the short period of time that it has been together. Formed in 2005 to record the original songs of Dawn Drake, the band shortly thereafter started to play venues in and around New York City, including the prestigious Brooklyn Academy of Music Cafe Live series, Medgar Evers College Womens Week, venues on NYC's legendary Bleecker Street, DROM, Nublu, Esperanto, Oliva, Jules Bistro, Boom, L'orange Bleue and others.

An active musician in New York City's African, Brazilian and Latin music scene, Dawn Drake started her career as an electric bassplayer
and percussionist. Now she is known first and foremost as a singer-songwriter, composer and bandleader.

As a Slovenian-American, Dawn's love of a variety of music first came from home. Later, she began traveling and studying world music at the University of Ghana, West Africa where she lived for a year. Upon moving to New York City, she started to play bass and percussion with groups which have included Obini Ashe; Beat the Donkey, Samba New York, The Femm Nameless, Jojo Kuo,Manmzel, Paprika, Azouhouni Adu, Nepo Soteri and others.

Dawn studied and played congas and bat in Cuba, and samba percussion in Brazil, where she played in Rio de Janiero's Carnaval. She has shared
the stage with Me'shell N'degeocello, Cyro Baptista, Trey Anastasio, Mo'Guajiro, Los Jovenes del Barrio, Kokolo, Jorge Alab and members of Antibalas. She has appeared on The CBS Early Show, and Telemundo TV, PBS, WBAI, and played stages such as Symphony Space, SOB's, The Zinc Bar, Rockefeller Center's Rainbow Room, Radio City Music Hall, BAM CAFE, The Walker Art Center, Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, the New Orleans Jazz Festival.

"Dawn Drake & ZapOte" have performed live on WBAI, KPFA Pacifica Radio in Berkeley, KUSP in Santa Cruz, and WTJU in Charlottesville. They have toured Europe and the East and West Coast of the US, and they were featured performers at BAMCafe Live in 2007, the multi-city Bluemont Concert Series in Virginia, 2008, the Wisteria Cornstalk Festival and Culturefest WV in 2009, the Downtown Berkeley Music Festival in 2009 and 2010, the Brooklyn Academy of Music Cafe Live Music series 2010, and the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens Chili Pepper Festival in 2010. Their full-length album and two EPs are available at CD Baby, (link hidden), as well as on itunes at (link hidden).

Please let us know what type of venue you wish to have us perform so that we can provide the appropriate sound equipment specifically for your event.