Joe's Pub Makes Brooklyn Debut at Great GoogaMooga Festival Today

Joe's Pub at The Public will make its debut in Brooklyn as a co-presenter at the second annual Great GoogaMooga Festival in Prospect Park. The three-day outdoor food, drink and music festival is produced by Superfly Presents and will take place today, May 17 through Sunday, May 19, 2013. The Joe's Pub Stage will host eight performances on Saturday, May 18 and Sunday, May 19.

The lineup for the Joe's Pub Stage includes Brooklyn Bhangra party band RED BARAAT; melodic folk trio PEARL AND THE BEARD; high-energy 8-piece Afro-Colombian outfit M.A.K.U. SOUNDSYSTEM; sizzling Parisian-style jazz band THE HOT SARDINES, iconic New Orleans artist JONATHAN BATISTE; cabaret superstar and comedienne LADY RIZO, gospel and roots vocalist MARCELLE DAVIES LASHLEY and Mexican brass band BANDA DE LOS MUERTOS. These artists join a list of over twenty bands confirmed for GoogaMooga including Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Flaming Lips, The Darkness, Matt & Kim, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, Father John Misty, De La Soul, Cults, Sharon Van Etten and more.

The leading showcase venue in New York, Joe's Pub continues to set the standard for music programming that highlights diversity, excellence and accessibility. In addition to GoogaMooga, Joe's Pub has programmed several events outside of its downtown home at Astor Place including Make Music New York, Joe's Pub in the Park at the Delacorte Theater and The Cooper Hotel Summer Salon series. Through its partnership with GoogaMooga, Joe's Pub will strengthen its commitment to community engagement in all five boroughs, an essential piece of Public Theater founder Joe Papp's mission.

Since celebrated restaurateurs Luke Ostrom and Chef Andrew Carmellini joined the ranks in 2012, Joe's Pub at The Public has become one of the city's top destinations for music and food. GoogaMooga also celebrates the intersection of food and music by pairing 85 of New York's top restaurants with 75 brews and 100 wines.

BANDA DE LOS MUERTOS A few years ago while eating a taco Jacob Garchik first heard the magnificent sound of brass band music from the Mexican state of Sinaloa. He immediately bought a bunch of CDs and videos, exploring the genre. Living on the edge of the Mexican part of Sunset Park, he was sure that he could find some of this music performed live, just like it is in Chicago and LA. He searched the colorful night club posters up and down Fifth Avenue, and despite understanding no Spanish, he knew that one thing was clear: none of the bands pictured had enough players to form a genuine acoustic Banda-14! He called his friend Oscar and a dozen of their other friends, and Banda de los Muertos was born. Featuring his arrangements of classic Banda tunes of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries along with their own unique twist, Banda de los Muertos takes the traditional sound of Mexico and mixes it with the lens of Brooklyn to create a truly astounding sound. http://www.bandadelosmuertos.com/

THE HOT SARDINES Take a blustery brass lineup, layer it over a rhythm section led by a stride-piano virtuoso in the Fats Waller vein, and tie the whole thing together with a one-of-the-boys frontwoman whose vocals have been compared to Anita O'Day's, and you have the Hot Sardines. In a short time, the Hot Sardines have gone from their first gig - at a coffee shop on the last Q train stop in Queens - to selling out Joe's Pub three times in three months, headlining at Lincoln Center's Midsummer Night Swing. The Sardine sound - wartime Paris via New Orleans, or the other way around - is steeped in hot jazz, salty stride piano, and the kind of music Louis Armstrong, Django Reinhardt and Waller used to make: Straight-up, foot-stomping jazz. http://hotsardines.com/

JONATHAN BATISTE Jonathan Batiste is an iconic artist, unique in this generation. With his voice on piano and dapper sense of style, he has ignited the NYC music scene. He is from a celebrated lineage of musicians. He has performed in over 40 countries, has appeared in Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, The Kennedy Center, Concertgebouw, has released several CD's, among them "Times In New Orleans", "Live In New York: At The Rubin Museum Of Art", and "MY N.Y.", and EP's "The Amazing Jon Batiste EP" and "In The Night EP". On T.V. he has been featured in the NBA All-Star Game Half-Time Show 2008, the HBO series "Treme", and BET. He has collaborated with Wynton Marsalis, Prince, Jimmy Buffett, Harry Connick Jr., Roy Hargrove and Cassandra Wilson. Jonathan Batiste is the founder and leader of The Stay Human Band, a modern jazz ensemble noted for their world-class music, high energy and uplifting spirit. http://jonathanbatiste.com/

LADY RIZO Though it is rumored that she is the product of a night of unrestrained indulgence between Peggy Lee, Mel Brooks, Nina Simone, Dean Martin and Janis Joplin the truth is Lady Rizo was raised by theatrical gypsies with the highest show business ethics. When she almost looked of age she rebelled against the comforting, unscrubbed, rustic life and set out for a world of harsh metropolitan sophisticates. The 'Cabaret Superstar' (New York Magazine), comedienne and chanteuse revives the genre by creating vintage arrangements & theatrical explorations of pop songs from every decade. Lady Rizo (nee Amelia Zirin-Brown) co-created the cult caburlesque spectacular Lady Rizo & the Assettes in 2005. In January 2010 she won her first Grammy on a duet with acclaimed cellist Yo-Yo Ma that was released on a Holiday album featuring Diana Krall, James Taylor and Alison Krauss among others. http://www.ladyrizo.com/

M.A.K.U. SOUNDSYSTEM Comprised of 8 members, hailing mostly from Colombia, M.A.K.U. SoundSystem makes big music that begins in traditional Afro- Colombian rhythms and ends somewhere in the punk-jazz stratosphere. Clarinet, trombone, sax, guitarra, and Latin percussion supplement a rambunctious, driving rock core, creating a sound familiar enough to be danceable but always surprising.http://www.makusoundsystem.com/

MARCELLE DAVIES LASHLEY Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, powerhouse gospel vocalist Marcelle Davies-Lashley is a classic, hardworking New York singer. She's one of those women that you have seen all over town, making everyone else sound great. She has been seen with Carl Hancock Rux, Lizz Wright, and Toshi Reagon and BigLovely amongst others, and she's now ready to finally claim her place on center stage. Her sound can be described as a mix of gospel, jazz, and R&B, but it's much more than that. Marcelle Davies-Lashley gives a soul and an inspiration to music rarely seen. Her voice is an uplifting and inspiring instrument. Her songs speak directly to her history of hard work, moving its sound right into the hearts of her listeners. http://www.marcelledavieslashley.com/

PEARL AND THE BEARD Pearl and the Beard is three voices, one cello, one guitar, one glockenspiel, one melodica, several drums, one accordion, ninety-six teeth, and one soul. Former strangers Jocelyn Mackenzie, Emily Hope Price, and Jeremy Styles were united in the great city of New York. Each had migrated there from a far corner of the nation with naught but food in their pockets and money in their bellies. Since then, the three have nested, and their unique brand of brightly melodic songcraft continues to blossom of its own accord. The band's genre-bending and expectation-defying sound has since burst the trio out of the confines of the New York music scene, allowing them to traipse the United States on a multitude of national tours and across the pond for a hugely successful inaugural UK tour in 2011.http://pearlandthebeard.com/

RED BARAAT Formed in 2008, Red Baraat is a pioneering eight-piece band from Brooklyn, New York. Conceived by Sunny Jain, the group has drawn worldwide praise for its singular sound-a merging of hard driving North Indian bhangra rhythms with elements of jazz, go-go, brass funk, and hip-hop. Created with no less a purposeful agenda than manifesting joy and unity in all people, Red Baraat's spirit is worn brightly on its sweaty and hard-worked sleeve. http://www.redbaraat.com/

Joe's Pub at The Public is one of New York City's most celebrated venues for emerging and established performance artists. Named for Public Theater founder Joe Papp, Joe's Pub debuted in 1998 and plays a vital role in The Public's mission of supporting young artists while providing established artists with an intimate space to perform and develop new work. Joe's Pub presents talent from all over the world as part of The Public's programming downtown at its Astor Place home, hosting approximately 800 shows and serving over 100,000 audience members annually. The diverse roster of programming featured at Joe's Pub includes top performers from Broadway, cabaret, dance, world, singer-songwriter, jazz, country and indie genres as well as New York Voices, its commissioning initiative, today's rising stars and GRAMMY Award winners. Joe's Pub also collaborates with other Public Theater programs to present events such as the Under the Radar Incoming series and the Public Forum lecture and debate series. The New York Times has praised Joe's Pub as at the "nexus" of "a downtown axis of clubs whose performers gleefully fuzz the boundaries between old and new, and between pop, rock, jazz, rhythm-and-blues, swing, country, world music and performance art." Its elegant neoclassical design, intimate atmosphere, and superior acoustics have consistently landed the venue on annual Best of New York lists. A top-to-bottom renovation was completed in 2011, leading to improved sightlines, expanded seating capacity and a new menu from acclaimed Chef Andrew Carmellini. http://www.joespub.com/; @joespub

ABOUT GREAT GOOGAMOOGA: Great GoogaMooga is an amusement park of food, drink and music produced by Superfly Presents, the Co-Founders and Producers of Bonnaroo and Outside Lands, in partnership with entertainment entrepreneur Peter Shapiro (Brooklyn Bowl, Capitol Theatre, Relix Magazine). Returning to Brooklyn's Prospect Park for its second year, GoogaMooga will take place over the course of three days, May 17, 18 and 19, 2013. The festival will see 85 of New York's top restaurants paired with 75 brews, 100 wines and 20 live performances. www.googamooga.com; @GoogaMooga