About

 Soulsha is a party, a revolution, and an adventure through different traditions. It brings together some of Boston’s top musicians in Scottish, West African, and Funk music to create a sound you won’t find anywhere else on the planet.

Soulsha’s first LP, “Carry it On” will be released nationally May 31st.

“Multi-talented and visionary, Soulsha is more than a fresh breeze blowing; it’s a tsunami of hope and high energy intercultural awareness washing onto our shores just when we need it. DANCE and ACT now!”

–Alasdair Fraser, Scottish Fiddler

Soulful call and response singing, masterful improvisation, traditional Senegalese and Scottish dancing and incredible energy make every Soulsha show an unforgettable live experience. Intricate rhythms, soaring bagpipe melodies, and New Orleans-infused horn lines come together seamlessly, and the joy of music rises above all differences, reminding us that we’re all in this together.

“Soulsha had the crowd up on its feet and dancing at Boston Celtic Music Festival…. Their high-energy fusion of sounds brought an exciting youthful energy to the festival, closing out the day-time part of our festival with a party.”

Jon Dorn, Festival Organizer, Boston Celtic Music Festival

The band formed through a series of serendipitous meetings in the thriving and intersecting multi-cultural melting pot of Boston. Many of the members are virtuosic and highly esteemed tradition-bearers in their styles. In Soulsha, they saw a chance to bridge divides. The music they’ve created is a conversation between cultures that breaks down all the boundaries, moving the audience to abandon their assumptions as they lose themselves on the dance floor.

“…sure to turn anyone into a dancer. …vibrant and never repetitive. …Truly unlike any other jazz or Celtic band out there….”

~Kathryn Leeber (The Noise Boston)

Soulsha will delight lovers of everything from jam bands to bluegrass. While it shares obvious roots with Afro-Celt Sound System’s electronic fusion, the funk-inspired sound of Soulsha puts tradition and interchange center stage, bringing the party energy of Rebirth Brass Band, and the cultural gravitas of masters like Malian Toumani Diabaté.

The sound is fun but deep, fresh but familiar, immigrant and yet deeply American.

For several years, Soulsha has been developing their sound while bringing audiences to their feet at a string of northeastern US festivals including Outside the Box Boston, Tartan Day New York City, South Hadley Falls Fest, Wake Up the Earth, Glasgowlands Highland Games and Boston Celtic Music Festival. Now they are ready to take the party further afield.

“…this is purely infectious stuff… It’s fresh, bold and exciting, and defies you to listen without moving and grooving to the beat….”

–Sean Smith, Boston Irish Reporter

“Soulsha is truly unique. And one of the most exciting bands I’ve ever seen. Can’t have them here often enough!”

–Ellen Sturgis, Executive Director, Amazing Things Arts Center, Framingham MA

 

Members

Lamine Touré – Sabar Drums/Vocals

Lamine Touré is widely recognized as one of Senegal’s leading percussionists.  Born into a griot family of sabar drummers, Lamine Touré has been drumming since the age of four, performing with his family troupe at weddings, baptisms, and dance events.  From 1997-2001, he enjoyed a fruitful career with the Senegalese mbalax band Nder et le Setsima Group, performing at Bercy (Paris), the Festival International de Jazz (Montréal) and Central Park Summerstage (New York). Since 2002, Lamine Touré has been Artist-in-Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he directs the Senegalese drumming ensemble, Rambax MIT.  Touré is also the founder of the Boston-based Afro-mbalax band, Group Saloum.  He continues to teach sabar drumming and dance classes in the Boston area, conducting workshops and lecture-demonstrations at local schools and universities.  For more information, visit www.laminetoure.com.

 

 

 

Elias Alexander – Bagpipes/Fiddle/Whistle/Vocals

Elias Alexander is a singer, multi-instrumentalist, and actor, and is one of a handful of musicians from the US who are on the forefront of creativity within contemporary Celtic music. He graduated from Middlebury College in 2013 with a BA in music. Since then he has composed for, lead, and toured with several bands including Soulsha, an eight-piece Afro-Celtic Funk band, and The Bywater Band, an innovative Celtic ensemble. He also plays with other bands including Fàrsan, MAC, and Seven Nations, and has performed with greats of the Celtic world such as Alasdair Fraser, Carlos Nuñez, and Gillebride MacMillan.

Elias has appeared at major festivals, including Celtic Connections (Glasgow, Scotland), Outside the Box Boston, Fresh Grass, Festival of Small Halls (PEI), Austin Celtic Festival, KVMR Celtic Festival, and many, many more.

In addition to his Celtic and fusion music projects, he is an accomplished songwriter in other styles. He is the composer and music director of Taking Our Life, a new play which premiered in November 2017 in Ashland, Oregon. He also acted and sang in the show.

As an educator he is in demand for music camps around the US. He is a regular staff member at Alasdair Fraser’s Sierra Fiddle Camp, and has been a guest instructor at other camps including Boston Harbor Scottish Fiddle School, and FiddleQuest Camps.

Chris Southiere – Drums

 

Charles Berthoud – Bass

British bassist, Charles Berthoud (pronounced BEAR-too), is changing the way we think about the bass guitar. Charles is a pioneer of the technique of two handed tapping. Before graduating Berklee College of Music with highest honors, Charles co-authored an instructional book, Two-Handed Tapping, with Jim Stinnett. Now, his talents are in high demand as a touring and studio musician.

Half British, half Finnish, and living in the United States, Charles Berthoud is an international artist in the truest form. He has conducted workshops and clinics across the northeast, including at Berklee and the New Hampshire Bass Fest.

Charles has performed at prestigious venues in all four corners of the United States, including The Capitol Center for the Arts, The Palace Theater, and the Agganis Arena in Boston, MA. After touring and recording as a sideman on a dozen records and tours, Charles now has three solo albums under his belt. While New Age of Solo Bass introduced his technical skills to the world, his follow up, Don’t Look Back, is a compositional tour de force. Charles’s third album, Infinity includes collaborations with world-class session musicians from all over the world.

 

Neil Pearlman – Keyboards/Accordion/Mandolin/Vocals

Multi-instrumentalist, stepdancer and host of podcast TradCafe, Neil Pearlman is a vital and distinctive voice in contemporary traditional music. Described as “a tremendous pianist” on BBC Radio Scotland and “a force to be reckoned with” by WGBH’s Brian O’Donovan, Neil is recognized in many Celtic music circles for his unique approach to the piano. Rooted in traditional Cape Breton piano styles, he adds jazz harmony and draws on the syncopations of funk, Cuban and Brazilian dance music to create a unique and infectious sound. It was this innovative style that led legendary Cape Breton fiddler Jerry Holland to say “watching Neil’s hands on the piano was like watching two spiders on crack!”

Growing up in a musical family, Neil was immersed in Scottish and Cape Breton music and dance from the start. He began dancing at the age of 3 and the piano followed soon after. Joining his parents and siblings on stage as the family band Highland Soles, Neil learned the art of performance early at festivals and concert halls across New England. At the age of 11, he toured as a stepdancer with his mother Laura Scott in Natalie MacMaster’s high-powered show and a few years later he released his first album accompanying his father, fiddler Ed Pearlman. More recently he has continued to work with family members, releasing the album Run to Fly in 2015 with the band Alba’s Edge, co-led with his sister Lilly Pearlman. The album was produced by BBC Folk Musician of the Year Aidan O’Rourke, featuring original music written by Neil and Lilly and was lauded as “sophisticated, mellow, contemporary folk-jazz” by fRoots magazine.

Today Neil’s musical projects run the gamut from deeply traditional to refreshingly contemporary. In addition to Soulsha he collaborates regularly with fiddlers Kevin Henderson, Katie McNally, Alden Robinson, Galen Fraser, and Ed Pearlman, He released a duo album with saxophonist Dylan Sherry (also in Soulsha) of improvisations around traditional melodies and performs with Soulsha front man Elias Alexander in the quartet Fàrsan, mixing Gaelic song, stepdance, fiddle and pipes.

Neil’s website is www.neilpearlman.com
TradCafe can be found at www.tradcafe.org

Dylan Sherry – Saxophones/Vocals

A stalwart of the greater Boston music scene, Dylan Sherry can be heard with a wide variety of projects around the city as a bandleader and sideman. His background playing saxophone in the surprisingly vibrant Maine jazz scene and subsequent studies in jazz and classical performance have resulted in an expressive and versatile musical voice. Outside of Soulsha he is a part of Pearlman / Sherry, a duo with pianist Neil Pearlman, his groups Sudden Duo and Spontaneous Trio, experimental contemporary trio Transpiler and the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra, to name just a few.

 

 

 

 

Jake Galloway – Trumpet/Vocals

Hailing from Southern NH, Jake Galloway’s trumpet playing has become a force to be reckoned with in the music scene of the Greater Boston area. Called upon as a studio trumpet player and freelancer, alike, TrumpetJakeG keeps a busy schedule performing with three different bands full-time and often subs with a number of other groups throughout the New England area. In addition to Soulsha, he is a founding member of the Boston-based 9-piece funk wedding band PK and The Mighty Seven. If he’s not performing, recording, practicing or teaching trumpet, you can likely find him on the golf course close-by to where he currently resides in Lowell MA working grounds crew or trying to better his single-digit handicap. A graduate of the Music Ed. and Performance programs at UMass Lowell (‘14), Soulsha’s upcoming album will be the first full-length album Jake has recorded as a full-time member of a project! Find out more at trumpetjakeg.com and follow his Instagram at @trumpetjakeg

 

 

Conor Hearn – Guitars/Vocals

Conor Hearn is a stylistically diverse guitar player and instructor who specializes in accompaniment of traditional Irish and Scottish fiddle playing. Hailing from the Irish music communities of Washington D.C. and Maryland, Conor grew up playing fiddle and guitar in the traditional Irish music sessions. While studying to attain his B.A in English Literature with a minor in Music from Tufts University, Conor started working as a professional guitar player by lending his innovative rhythmic skills to the panoply of groups and projects that are taking shape in the Boston area folk music scene. He has since performed on programs like Brian O’Donovan’s Celtic Sojourn and taught guitar at music festivals such as Alasdair Fraser’s Sierra Fiddle Camp, while establishing himself as a cutting-edge Scottish and Irish player with groups like Soulsha, Rakish, and Pumpkin Bread.  Conor currently makes his home in Medford, MA where he performs and teaches regularly.