NATURALLY 7 – BIO 2013

 

Short Facts:

World tours as special guests of Michael Buble

• 3 duets with Michael Buble Special guest for Coldplay

• Duet with Ludacris on Quincy Jones most recent studio album

• BET Honours for Herbie Hancock• Night Of The Proms with Mick Hucknall and The Jacksons

• Release of “All Natural Live” – DVD and CD in 2013

• Release of new studio album in 2013

 

For Naturally 7, the turning point came in the fall of 2007. From quiet success allover Europe they have been propelled onto the world stage, performing beforemillions of people.As the special guest of internationally acclaimed singer Michael Buble, Naturally7 have been met with standing ovations nightly in Europe, the U.K., Canada,Australia and the U.S!It was 2009 when the group truly hit the ground running. In January they playedto a packed house at London’s Pigalle, which included a number of famous faces– Coldplay’s Chris Martin, legendary musician and producer Brian Eno. The nextday, by invitation the group joined Coldplay and Eno in the studio. From the UK,Naturally 7 travelled to California, where they performed at the prestigious TED(Technology, Entertainment, Design) Conference, receiving a standing ovation.“Perhaps the most memorable presentation involved Naturally 7, a group ofseven musicians who practice something they call “Vocal Play”. It’s hard todescribe their act other than saying each of them used their voices in unison torecreate a different musical instrument from drums to brass instruments toguitars. They made beatboxing look like child’s play. Their Wall of Sound song,earned them a standing ovation.” (Daniel Sieberg/CBS News).While the road ahead looks brilliant – to truly understand Naturally 7’s meteoricrise, one must first look at the whirlwind, that has been, the last 3 years.2008 was nothing short of remarkable and the highlight reel, one to take noteof. In May they made their national U.S. Television debut on Ellen and joinedBublé for a guest appearance on The Today Show. More recently, they openedfor Jay Leno in Las Vegas and performed at his ‘Tonight Show’, were guests onTavis Smiley, performed at NARM, helped celebrate Quincy Jones’ 75th Birthdayin Montreux and greeted a hometown crowd at Madison SquareGarden. Following that show, they travelled to London to play the renownedRoyal Variety Television show, capping the evening off, by meeting His RoyalHighness Prince Charles.With their rich harmonies, an unbelievable ability to replicate instruments and astage presence that can be felt in every seat of the house, Naturally 7, the firstvocal play group ever, are amazing, charming fans where ever they perform.Today Naturally 7 are Roger Thomas (musical director, arranger, 1st Baritone,Rap), Warren Thomas (percussion, guitar, clarinet, 3rd tenor) Rod Eldridge (1sttenor, scratching, trumpet), Napoleon (Polo) Cummings (4th Tenor, guitar),Dwight Stewart (2nd baritone, vocals, trumpet), Garfield Buckley (2nd Tenor,Harmonica) and “Hops” Hutton (Bass).The origins of the group date back to New York City in 1999 when RogerThomas started the group with his brother, Warren, and five other talentedsingers they had come to know over the years from singing around the city.Having been in and out of several traditional male groups over the years, Rogerdeveloped an affinity for a cappella sounds and a unique ability to create distinctharmony arrangements. When invited to sing at a major a cappella competitionin New York, they won the competition, moved onto the nationals and took awaytwo more wins.Riding the wave of this newfound success and still unable to decide if Naturally 7were going to be an a cappella group or a traditional band, Roger had a novelidea: they could be both.He remembered as a child, his brother Warren always wanted a drum set buttheir mother always told him no because it was just too noisy. So Warren learnedto make true drum sounds, with different ways of making the kick, toms, snare,cymbals, and other drum sounds, to compensate for not having real drums toplay. Roger approached Warren with the idea from their childhood, and asked ifhe could become the band’s drummer, so to speak, to accompany Naturally 7 onup-tempo songs.The idea evolved, and the other band members found unique aspects of theirown voices to determine which members would BE which instrument. After all,Roger thought, if the human voice truly was an instrument, it should not matterwhich instrument it needed to be. And for Naturally 7, it really didn’t matter;“VOCAL PLAY” was born. What is the difference between Vocal Play and acappella? A cappella is defined as singing without instruments. Vocal Play issinging AS instruments, and BECOMING an instrument with the voice.What makes Naturally 7 special, is that every instrument sound that they sing iscreated from the human voice. There are no actual drums, guitars, horns, flutes,or any other instrument that is heard when listening to them perform; it’s the bandmembers playing each of their vocal instruments.The group has recorded a number of CD’s over the years – “Non Fiction” (2000)the aptly titled “What Is It” (2003), “Christmas …It’s A Love Story” (2004) and“Ready II Fly” (2006). The latter contains the YouTube-hit “Feel It (In the AirTonight”). Naturally 7’s now famous Paris subway performance of the song, hasreceived over four and a half million hits on YouTube alone and the number ofpeople discovering the group, adds to that figure daily. The song turned into aTop 3-chart-success in France, Belgium and South Africa and made the singlecharts in other European countries, such as Germany, Switzerland, Italy andPortugal.In January 2009, the group released a special album, ‘Wall Of Sound’ exclusivelyfor the UK and Ireland, to commemorate their participation at the ‘Royal VarietyPerformance’. The album contained known material from previous albums, aswell as 5 brand-new tracks and entered the British Album-Charts in the first weekafter release at #29.They have appeared on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, performing“Stardust” with Michael Bublé. In November 09, the group travelled to Bermuda,taking part in Quincy Jones’ 2009 Bermuda Music Festival performing before anenthusiastic crowd!February of 2010 saw Naturally 7 spend three weeks in Vancouver asperformance guests during the Olympic Winter Games and in March theyreturned as Special Guests on Bublé’s ‘Crazy Love’-Tour around the World!Naturally 7’s most recent CD/DVD ‘VocalPlay’, contains self-penned originalssuch as “SOS (Anybody Out There),” power ballad “If You Love Me”, theMotown-influenced “Ready or Not”, the Latin 768 and a duet with Michael Bubléon the Dinah Washington classic, “Relax Max”. The bonus DVD includes HDLive material from their Madison Square Garden performance, extensiveinterviews with each group member as well as their video clips.In the fall of 2010 Naturally 7 along with Ludacris were featured on the title trackof Quincy Jones’ new CD – Soul Bossa Nostra that led to a performance on TheView in November.They continued to tour the world with Michael Buble, receiving standing ovationsnightly and rave reviews:“Openers Naturally 7, a seven –piece vocal group from New York who at onepoint joined Buble during his set, delivered a jaw-dropping vocal symposium. Tocall them an a cappella group would be a gross understatement, for theyperformed songs with trumpets, electric guitars, bass cello, harmonica, a fulldrum kit, and more – using only their voices. It was like a striking optical illusion,only aural. (Boston Globe, Nov 2010)“Rarely does an opener melt the crowd like Naturally 7 did. By the time their halfhour set ended, all too soon, many jumped to their feet to give the stellarmusicians a standing ovation.”In February 2011, Naturally 7 performed at the BET Honours, receiving astanding ovation for “Rockit” their Herbie Hancock tribute song. Another standout moment came in August when they were invited to take part in the MartinLuther King Jr. National Memorial Week Celebrations.“Silver Bells” became their next collaboration with Michael Bublé, appearing onhis multi-million selling and chart topping Christmas album. They also made aguest appearance on his first NBC special and joined him for a performance onThe Today Show.In the spring of 2012 Naturally 7 recorded a DVD in Hamburg “All Natural Live”,which will be released this spring. In June the group made a return appearanceat the Playboy Jazz Festival at the Hollywood Bowl, receiving a standing ovationfrom the crowd of 18 thousand! They will return for their third consecutiveappearance, this year.In 2012 Naturally 7 continued touring Europe, South America, South Africa,Australia, Canada and the U.S. Two further highlights created a perfect endingfor 2012. The group were special guests on Coldplay’s Mylo Xyloto Tour atBrooklyn’s Barclays Center, and they performed 32 shows at Europe’s mostsuccessful Arena-event “Night Of The Proms”, along with Mick Hucknall and TheJacksons.In June of 2013 they are thrilled to be returning as Special Guests for superstarMichael Buble’s record-breaking, 10-show performances at London’s O2 Arena.When not on the road Naturally 7 has been in the studio recording material for anew release in 2013.Their phenomenal talent, coupled with a live show that many consider to be oneof the best in the world, has Naturally 7 poised for continued success!