Jessica Herman

If you can wait an entire year anticipating the moment that the clock strikes midnight on December 31, you can easily allow yourself to be immersed in the musical experience that is Black Violin for one night. Stopping at the Palmer House Hilton this New Year's Eve to join a handful of local DJs, the violin-stroking duo requests that you open your mind for ten short minutes.

The classically trained violinists, Wil-b and Kev Marcus, say that's all they need to hook audiences into their work and leave listeners wanting more. Together they improvise violin playing with forty-odd tracks from Snoop Dogg to Kanye West spinning in the background.

"Back in the thirties and forties, a band would be headed by a saxophone player," Wil-b says. "We're bringing the musician back into the spotlight. The MC stole the spotlight."

Friends since middle school in Florida, the musicians started out in the industry as producers by co-founding the production crew DKNEX with three other producers. Two and a half years ago they added their own music to the mix.

After winning the Apollo Theater Showtime in Harlem three times in the past three months and accompanying Alicia Keys at the Billboards Awards performance, Black Violin is starting to garner recognition for its fresh sounds. "We're trying to introduce [people] to the violin. It's not just a square type of instrument," says Wil-b, mentioning that their performance venues range from schools to Bar Mitzvah parties. "We make it a show, give it a theater. We're speaking with the violins and not with our mouths."

(2004-12-21)

Also by Jessica Herman

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