Yo Mama's Big Fat Booty Band (Opening: Stehpanie Rooker)-SUNKEN GARDEN SUNDAYS

Yo Mama's Big Fat Booty Band "You talkin' 'bout my Mama??" Indeed they are. When the Booty Band hits the stage, everybody dances. A new funk phenomenon from Asheville, NC is perking up eyebrows and ear holes as they spread their festive, exciting and unpredictable stage show throughout the US and even as far south as Negril, Jamaica. They've taken a slightly less than subtle approach to naming the band, producing a moniker which at once describes the sound, the fury, the philosophy of the band. They are Yo Mama's Big Fat Booty Band. Their horn, guitar and percussion-based sound is designed to make feet flood the dance floor, and they succeed with alarming proficiency. Adding elements of hip hop, reggae, ska, and latin to the mix, funk is merely the base from which their endless exploits refuel. The band is excited about bonding these genres of music together into a style they call "Bounce Music." Stephanie Rooker Stephanie Rooker is working on making people listen, on calling us to take a moment to recognize what we have, and what we have to give...and this is what her debut recording project, Tellin You Right Now, is all about. Drawing from her broad range of musical influences: from singer-songwriter folk of her native Appalachia to her immersion in traditional folk music of Ghana, from her distinctive grasp of the cultural evolution of American gospel--blues--jazz--soul--hip-hop to her passion for the conscious vibes of ?70s soul and reggae music, her sound is fresh and cultivated. Rooker sings with the careful phrasing of a soulful Eva Cassidy, the wailing of a young, blues-steeped Bonnie Raitt, and the self-affirmative slant of Stevie Wonder.