In 2003 Al was working at Los Angeles City Hall for an after school program under Mayor Richard Riordan. One day while sitting at his desk, doing the 8:00 – 5:00 gig, he gets a very unusual phone call. The call was from a brand new night club called, NYSE (New York Soul Experience). The mission was, put together the best band he’s always wanted to assemble, build a repertoire of great soul tunes and perform as the house band, 4 nights a week while guests ate authentic, “New York soul food,” drank delicious cocktails and grooved to some smooth soul sounds by Al & his band.
The first phone call Al made was to his bass player, a very funky Danish guy named, Thomas Risell. In a matter of one or two days, the band was put together with Michael Finding (drums), his brother Martin Finding (guitar), Peter Hellermann (keys), Bob Porter (rhythm guitar), Susanne Carstensen (backing vocals) & Al on lead vocals and trombone.
And so the band performed night after night at NYSE. It was fantastic while it lasted. People loved the food and the band and the band was enjoying gigging so much. They were playing very tight together and were sounding awesome.
However, after just 5 months the party ended and NYSE closed it’s doors.
At this point, Al returned home to USA and let a bit of time go by before deciding what to do next. After a month or so, Al put together a smaller combination of players and bringing on board a brand new keyboardist from Sweden, Daniel Fridell.
Together they found an amazing sound! Nearly 8 years later, the band still has the same members and that sound they have together has reached an international audience.
Al Campos & SoulHarmonic launched an international career with the release of their first CD, “Old School Lovin’ in the summer of 2007.
Released by positiveSOUL Productions, the CD is available on iTunes, CDbaby, Amazon and all other major internet music portals.
In the summer of 2009 the CD was re-released in Japan by Grey Dog’s Records.
Currently as of this writing, October 2011, the band has been and still are actively working on brand new songs for the next CD. They’ve also been touring around, in particular in Tanzania, East Africa where they have performed three times since 2008. Most recently in Zanzibar at The Jahazi Jazz Festival this past September 2011.
SoulHarmonic is:
Martin Finding (guitars), Thomas Risell (bass), Michael Finding (drums), Daniel Fridell (keyboards) & Al Campos (vocals & trombone)
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