Joyful rebellion, funky and horn-fueled"–Entertainment Weekly

The Texas blues guitar legend Johnny Clyde Copeland recognized his daughter Shemekia's talent early on, and he brought her on stage at Harlem's Cotton Club when she was eight. She felt only embarrassment then, but at 15 she felt the calling. "It was like a switch went off in my head," recalls Shemekia, "and I wanted to sing. It became a want and a need. I had to do it." Shemekia's blast-furnace voice has brought plenty of comparisons to Etta James, Tina Turner, and other vocal greats. But really Shemekia is an independent artist --a young woman with not only a great voice but an ear for songs with insight and emotional honesty. If there's a blues song for our times, it's her rendition of her father's composition "Circumstances," a crushing depiction of job loss and economic powerlessness. Shemekia comes to The Ark with a hot-off-the-burners new album, "33 1/3."