Award-winning, New York-based vocal virtuoso, Gino Sitson is a French-American originally from the Bamileke region of Cameroon, Central Africa. His family comes from a long line of musicians known as Ntontas (“players of horns”) and his mother was a vocalist and choir director. He and his siblings were introduced to blues, jazz and African traditional music early in life.
Gino Sitson holds a PhD in Musicology from Paris-Sorbonne University under the supervision of Professor Jean-Marc Chouvel. He also earned a MS degree in education sciences. His work focuses on music cognition, expressive properties of the voice and the process of transmitting music from the ‘black’ diaspora. Among them, he is particularly interested in Gwoka music from Guadeloupe. Dr. Sitson has released eight albums of his original music and continues to actively perform internationally as well as in his adopted home of New York City.
Dr. Sitson is a pioneer among multi-culturally influenced African musicians who are integrating into their unique musical styles their own exciting welter of “in-between” living experiences (north/south, tradition/modernity, 20th/21st century). His daring musical projects combine jazz, gospel, blues, and traditional African polyphonies, polyrhythms and melodies in a most innovative way. By freely combining his trademark vocal acrobatics with a creative command of oral and body percussions and miscellaneous effects, Sitson forges an eloquent vocabulary that communicates
Dr. Sitson’s four-octave vocal range added to his skills as a composer and arranger put him in high demand for recording sessions and for commercials and radio / television jingles (Danone, Dim, Peugeot, Vahine, etc). This versatile vocalist has performed in a musical and co-composed part of the music (Jeanne et le Garçon Formidable). He has laid down tracks and shared the stage with Manu Dibango, Ron Carter, Papa Wemba, Wally Badarou, John Scofield, Geri Allen, David Gilmore,Haruko Nara, Bobby McFerrin, Frank Wess, Résidente, Ray Lema, Craig Harris, James Hurt, Antoine Roney, John William, Mario Canonge, Wallace Roney, Brice Wassy, Oliver NGoma, Exile One, Steve Potts, So Why? (Featuring Youssou NDour, Papa Wemba, Wally Badarou, Jabu Khanyile & Bayete, Lourdes Van-Dunem, and Lucky Dube) and La Compagnie Creole, among others. In 2008, Mr. Sitson was invited by Bobby McFerrin to join him on a PBS documentary (“The music instinct: Science & Song”), to take part in a special project that took place at Carnegie Hall (“Instant Opera”). Dr. Sitson also perfo
A member of Chamber Music America, he is regularly engaged for movie scores and commercials, and composed musi
Dr. Sitson has been a Cultural Arts ambassador for the city of Miami (Florida)since 2006 and is also a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador to Cameroon.
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS: American Society for Ethnomusicology, American Musicological Society, ASCAP, Caribbean Studies Association, Chamber Music America, EthnomusiKa, IReMus / CNRS, SACEM, Society for Music Perception and Cognition, Société française d’analyse musicale, Société française d’ethnomusicologie.
Share


