"Life without music means a slow process of the devastation of humanity. To me, music means the sound of everything that belongs to the Higher Power." Jakobo
Music keeps my body and soul in a perfect relationship.
Jean Dorce, known as by friends and fans, singer, percussionist, and bandleader, He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology, Postgraduate Masters in Conflict Resolution at University of Massachusetts Boston. Jakobo founded his group, Akbadja Zile in 2006.
The band brings World Beat to new vibrational levels by presenting fusion music based firmly in the spiritual traditions of rural Haiti to new audiences. Akbadja Zile’s emphasis
on traditional Haitian rhythms such as Dahomey, Nago, Congo, and rara, is a wake-up call to Haitians both at home and in the diaspora, as well as to World Beat fans around the world.
Jakobo began his music career singing for church services and youth groups in Haiti.
After High School, he studied traditional music at the Ecole Nationale des Arts (National School of the Arts) in Port-au-Prince, which sponsored his original research of the
distinctive traditional music and culture of the Souvenance, Badjo and Soukri Danache region of Artibonite, Haiti. He was sponsored a green card by his father; and earned an
Associate Degree of Fine Arts at Roxbury community College, Boston, MA. Sergo Jean Noël of Zobop band, Louis Lesly Marcelin, known as Sanba Zao, has long served
as Jakobo’s mentor. Today, along with collaborators such as
saxophonist/ethnomusicologist Paul Austerlitz, Jakobo brings his unique World Beat vision, based in the spiritual traditions of rural Haiti, to people around the world.
An accomplished master of Haitian drumming as well as singing, Jakobo was recorded on the popular Angels in The Mirror: Vodou Music of Haiti CD. Kelemiwa was the EP Album by Jakobo & Akbadja Zile, released on May 1, 2018, on Akbadja Zile Production & Baz Art. He also accompanied several Haitian dance groups and completed workshops in the U.S and Haiti at venues such as the Lynn W, Rousier Academy in Port-au-Prince, New York University, Boston University, Dean College, Springstep Dance School, and the Dance Complex in Cambridge Massachusetts.
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