Born in the rural countryside near Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, Joan Soriano infuses steel string bachata with equal parts romance and grit. He is the star of Adam Taub’s The Duke of Bachata, was featured in Alex Wolfe’s critically acclaimed documentary, Santo Domingo Blues, and is on The Rough Guide’s “Bachata” compilation. A practitioner of palo and gaga, Soriano blends Afro-Dominican sacred traditions with bachata, imparting his music with down-to-earth spirit and danceability, preserving bachata’s roots and expanding on them.
This engagement of Joan Soriano is made possible through Southern Exposure: Performing Arts of Latin America, a program of Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts.