Michael Doucet Serves Up Some 'Solo Gombo'

WHASINGTON, DC. (Top40 Charts/ Smithsonian Folkways Recordings) - On April 22, 2008, Smithsonian Folkways Recordings will release the latest solo album by preeminent Cajun musician Michael Doucet. 'From Now On,' an engaging portrait of the music from southern Louisiana, demonstrates Doucet's unmatched career in shaping the Cajun style-and equally unmatched talent for performing

Doucet recorded each of the album's 19 tracks without rehearsal or overdubs during three sessions in Baton Rouge and at the La Louisianne Studio in Lafayette, Louisiana, where Aldus Roger and other Cajun greats have also recorded. 'From Now On' features Doucet on fiddle, octave violin, guitar and accordion, collaborating on some pieces with fiddler Mitchell Reed and New Orleans jazz and funk guitarist Todd Duke. The album encompasses a wide range of regional music, from a Creole interpretation of Allen Toussaint's "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky," recorded the first time Doucet and Duke ever played together, to original compositions and traditional songs Doucet learned from legends Dennis McGee and Canray Fontenot. In his track notes, Doucet comments on the roots of Cajun music and the inspiration behind each song, offering personal details about the recording process that reveal his passion for the genre.

Michael Doucet received a National Heritage Fellowship award in 2005 from the National Endowment for the Arts for his contributions to American culture and Cajun tradition. In 1975, he had obtained a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, Folk Arts Apprenticeship Program, to study the tradition and technique of Cajun and Creole violinists throughout Louisiana such as B' B' and Calvin Carriere, Varise Connor, Lionel LeLieux, Dennis McGee and Canray Fontenot. As leader of the internationally acclaimed Cajun ensemble BeauSoleil, Doucet has introduced the sounds of southern Louisiana to audiences worldwide; the band also appears regularly on Garrison Keillor's 'Prairie Home Companion.' BeauSoleil won a GRAMMY award in 1998 for the Best Traditional Folk album, and remains the most groundbreaking and successful Cajun band ever.