Welcoming spring with a bang!

Here we are approaching spring in sunny South Africa and the music is ready to go forth and multiply even further after doing some memorable cosy fermentations through the winter. I have been busy playing many extremely enjoyable live shows with some great line ups while at the same time working on two fresh new albums.
 
First up was the launch of my exciting wave making Greg Georgiades & Ultra Natives group and the release of our new album 'ULTRA NATIVES'.This hyper fresh act includes the amazing Siya Makuzeni with her incredible vocal and trombone talent, as well as my two wonderfully talented twin nephews, David J Georgiades on drums and Jonathan Daniel Georgiades on bass. On steel string acoustic guitar and vocals is the highly acclaimed ex Tidal Waves guitarist, Jaco Mans. I'm on vocals, nylon string acoustic guitar, oud, soprano acoustic ukelele and solid body electric soprano ukelele(custom built for me by Andries Vorster who also designed and handwound the hot humbucker pickups) I have had great fun recording the album and playing some great live shows with this group. This is because our approach does not consider genre, thus allowing the fun and expression of music to lead the way in telling entertaining stories for all…and it seems that people are keen to shake the shackles of genre classification that has industrially divided and ruled for too long. The album is available on iTunes. Have a browse on www.ultranatives.com and get to know more about this group. There are no other Ultra Natives!
 
Second up is a new album 'Different Places' by The Uptown Rhythm Dogs featuring Neill Solomon on vocals, guitar and piano, Dan Chiorboli on percussion and myself on vocals, guitars, oud, ukelele, bouzouki, bass ukelele and oudtar. Over 30 years have flown by since the first album was released by this group and the members went their own ways. We kept in contact with each other over the years and this led us to the point of doing this new album. The album can be described as 'Pan African' world music and features some great guests such as the renowned René Lacaille from Reunion Island   on
accordion, N'Faly Kouyate..known as 'the Jimi Hendrix of the Kora', Sez Adamson on pedal steel guitar, Rajen Padayachee on karnatic violin and Chris Tokalon on sax.
 
I'm also a member of the Scicoustic group with Albert Meintjes on vocals and acoustic steel string guitar, Gideon Meintjes on drums and Wouter Reyneke on bass. After a number of memorable shows we are about to record a new album. I'm also still playing in the 'Strings 'n Skins' duo with the great tabla player, Ashish Joshi and with the 'In the Clouds' trio featuring Steve Newman on guitars, Ashish Joshi on tabla, percussion and myself on guitar, ukelele, bouzouki, oud and ukelele bass. Both Strings 'n Skins and In the Clouds are due for new albums in the near future.
In addition to all this, I also collaborate and play soprano ukelele at live dance events called 'Lets Swing It' with the great electroswing DJ, Michael Lesar. We have formed the band version of our duo and called it 'Full Swing'. An album is in the pipeline.
 
I truly count myself lucky to be involved with so many wonderful musicians who constantly lead me to new exciting music expressions and audiences who are more than willing to open their ears to fresh sounds. I'm happy that I haven't as yet found a comfort zone where I can sit back and be satisfied in a static kind of way. I suppose it's like being a shark that has to keep moving forward to keep the water flowing through it's gills. Once this is achieved one is energized and ready to tackle the open sea.
 
Let the hunt begin!
 
Greg