IN OTHER WORDS UNUSUAL CULTURAL BACKGROUND BRINGS DIVERSITY TO KEVIN JOHANSEN'S BILINGUAL MUSICAL STYLE.Byline: Sandra Barrera Staff Writer On a rainy Tuesday during the first Gulf War, Kevin Johansen Kevin Johansen was born in Fairbanks, Alaska in 1964 to an Argentine mother and an American father, lived most of his childhood in the San Francisco Bay Area, but moved with his family to Buenos Aires at the age of 12. was playing the famous CBGB CBGB Country, Blue Grass & Blues (NYC bar whose name came from music originally booked there) club in New York City New York City: see New York, city. New York City City (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. . A handful of friends were in the club, rooting him on. Later that night, owner Hilly Krystal approached Johansen with praise and the promise of a regular gig, but asked: ``Why do you sing in English and in Spanish?'' Given his name, Johansen gets asked this question a lot. But he doesn't mind. It allows the 30-something singer-songwriter - born in Alaska to an Argentinean mother and a father from Colorado - the chance to tell his story, which ultimately has come to shape his one-of-a-kind eclectic sound. On Saturday, Johansen and his band, the Nada, will showcase songs from the album ``Sur o no Sur'' at the California Plaza The name California Plaza may refer to one of the following locations in Los Angeles:
Johansen was selected to perform ``because we thought it was a very special album,'' conference co-founder Tomas Cookman says. ``And then, boom, he gets three Latin Grammy nominations.'' Johansen received nods for the album and for song and music video for the track ``La Procesion.'' ``I couldn't be in better company,'' Johansen says, putting himself next to Bebo and Cigala, Cafe Tacuba, Alejandro Sanz Alejandro Sanz, born Alejandro Sánchez Pizarro on December 18 1968 in Madrid, is a Spanish pop/ballad musician. Biography Alejandro Sanz is the second son of María Pizarro Medina from Alcalá de los Gazules, and Jesús Sánchez Madero from Algeciras. and Maria Rita Maria Rita (born September 19 1977 in São Paulo, Brazil) is the performance name of Maria Rita Mariano, a Brazilian singer. She is the daughter of famed pianist/arranger César Camargo Mariano and the late Brazilian singing legend Elis Regina and sister to Pedro Mariano. , one of whom will be awarded Album of the Year on Sept. 1 at the Shrine Auditorium The Shrine Auditorium is a landmark large-event venue in Los Angeles, California, USA. It is also the headquarters of the Al Malaikah Temple, a division of the Shriners. , and broadcast on CBS (Cell Broadcast Service) See cell broadcast. . ``There's a lot of great artists, but being the first Alaskan-Argentinean nominated for a Latin Grammy I guess is kind of a cool deal.'' Of course Johansen's recollections of life in Fairbanks, where he spent all of four years, are fuzzy. His family moved to Denver and then to Phoenix before settling in what he calls ``beautiful San Francisco'' in the '70s. As a child of two cultures, he was drawn to music like that of Atahualpa Yupanqui, considered the most important Argentinean folk singer of the 20th century. Tangos poured from the same speakers that played Cuban revolutionary anthems, Harry Belafonte and Frank Sinatra records. ``My mom would always say, 'In Alaska you danced to the rhythm of the washing machine and you cried to classical music' so I was a sensitive boy,'' he says. ``So there was an inclination, but I didn't grab an instrument really until I grabbed the guitar in Buenos Aires.'' When he was 12, Johansen and his mother - whose second marriage, to a Mexican painter, had ``gone sour pretty quickly'' - made the move to the Argentinean capital. He learned of their move the day before. ``It was a pretty traumatic experience,'' he says, adding that it was made all the worse by his inability to speak the language. But he managed. Before he knew it, he was a fluent, self-described ``Argenteenager,'' playing in a band that allowed him to travel the country. His band's record even went gold in Peru. But he left it all behind when he followed an Argentinean dancer, now his wife and the mother of his two daughters, to New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of in 1990. It's there Johansen found his ``artistic home,'' CBGB, where he got to hone his brand of bilingual songwriting. ``I like it when a song comes out in one language or another,'' he says. ``On some occasions, maybe, I might play with both languages when it's really organic and meant to be. I try to be original, you know, I really try to respect the songs over anything else.'' In 2000, Johansen returned to Argentina not knowing what was going to happen with his career. Not once during the time he was living in New York did he go knocking on the door of a record label. His goal was to develop as an artist, to find his identity, and it took him awhile. ``Of course it's weird having a gringo grin·go n. pl. grin·gos Offensive Slang Used as a disparaging term for a foreigner in Latin America, especially an American or English person. name, you know, being almost more Latino than gringo,'' he says. ``But I also find it kind of interesting and intriguing. It's a bit of a challenge for anybody who has prejudices and would want me to change my name to Roque roque: see croquet. Perez or David Santana Carlos, which some might have suggested at one point. But no, it's been an interesting ride so far.'' Sandra Barrera, (818) 713-3728 sandra.barrera(at)dailynews.com KEVIN JOHANSEN Where: California Plaza, 350 S. Grand Ave., Los Angeles. When: 8 p.m. Saturday. How much: Free. CAPTION(S): photo Photo: ``On some occasions, maybe, I might play with both languages when it's really organic and meant to be.'' - Kevin Johansen |
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