Chopteeth is a 12-piece Afrofunk orchestra exploring the common groove between the funkiest, most hip-shakin’ West African and American popular music on the planet.
The core of the Chopteeth sound is Afrobeat: a big-band funk invented by Fela Kuti in 1970’s Nigeria. Afrobeat is a spicy stew of modern jazz, Yoruba tribal music and burning, James Brown-inspired rhythms.
Chopteeth, the "Crazy Fools of Afrobeat", called for rhythmic regime change on the band's award-winnnig 2008 debut CD, with its dynamic original songs. And in 2010, the band's live CD unleashed the power of Africa's Golden Age, featuring choice selections from Ghana, Senegal, Congo, Guinea, and Nigeria.
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Since 2007, the members of the Washington Area Music Association have selected Chopteeth for a total of twelve Wammie Awards, including Artist of the Year, Debut CD of the Year, World Music CD (twice) and World Music Group (six times).
Over the last eight years, Chopteeth has performed all over the country, from the cast party for HBO's "The Wire," to the Congo Square World Music Festival in New Orleans, to colleges and festivals in many different states. The band can be seen regularly at top venues in Washington, DC, Baltimore and Virginia, including The Kennedy Center, The Smithsonian, The Music Center at Strathmore, Carter Barron Amphitheatre, The 9:30 Club, The Black Cat, Rock & Roll Hotel, Iota, Blues Alley, The State Theatre, and The 8x10 Club.
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The band also performs frequently at major festivals in the area, such as Artscape, The Duke Ellington Jazz Festival, The National Capitol Bar-B-Que Battle, The Silver Spring Jazz Festival, The Adams Morgan Day Festival, and many others.
Chopteeth has performed at shows with a wide range of critically acclaimed world music, soul and jazz-funk groups, including Aaron Neville, Derek Trucks Band, Ozomatli, Chuck Brown, Grupo Fantasma, Konono No. 1, Sierra Leone’s Refugee All Stars, Gov't Mule, Soulive, Greyboy Allstars, The Iguanas, War, Toubab Krewe and many more.
