With his stirringly soulful vocals reminiscent of Sam Cooke with the fire and passion of Al Green and his intelligent and biting blues guitar work, 25-year-old singer/guitarist/songwriter MURALI CORYELL is one of the most talented young proponents of Modern soul and blues.

Son of jazz-rock fusion pioneer Larry Coryell, MURALI grew up surrounded by great music. "I don't remember a time when there wasn't music around me. From the time I was 7 or 8 years old, I remember seeing and hearing, in addition to my dad's music, the music of The Becker Brothers, Miles Davis, George Benson, Billy Cobham and Stanley Clarke. They were always hanging around our house." MURALI began playing drums at age 8 and continued through junior high school. He started playing guitar after discovering the blues in his early teens. "I was into the music of Led Zeppelin, particularly a minor blues tune called "Since I've Been Loving You". My dad told me if I wanted to hear some real blues to get B.B. King's Live At The Regal which to this day I consider one of the greatest recordings ever made. The emotion and sadness in B.B. King's voice and guitar really spoke to me. That's when I first picked up a guitar." He took lessons for a while but picked up most of what he learned from listening to the music of other blues guitar greats...besides B.B., from early Clapton, Albert Collins, Jimi Hendrix and Albert King. The big turning point in MURALI's musical career came at age 17 when the attended the National Guitar Summer Workshop in Connecticut. "For the first time in my life I got serious about my music. I started playing all the time. I got into jazz." He joined a jazz ensemble at college, studied classical guitar and graduated with a degree in music theory and composition. MURALI formed a soul/blues band, The Ambassadors, in upstate New York in the early '90s. The band quickly became a regional favorite in New York's Hudson Valley area. In addition to his band, MURALI has performed with Richie Havens and played several dates with his father, including a jazz festival in Mexico in '92 and a guitar festival in Martinique in December '93 which also featured Kenny Burrell and Stanley Jordan. In the summer of '94, while a faculty member at Connecticut's Guitar Workshop, MURALI met Duke Robillard who was teaching a Master Class. "Robillard heard me sing at a concert and asked to sit in with my band. He called me a month later and hired me as second guitarist for his upcoming world tour. He featured me on a couple of vocal tunes, Ray Charles' "I Got A Woman" and Albert King's "The Hunter". Big Mo Records heard MURALI with Robillard at a gig in the D.C. area and immediately signed him to a record deal.

What follows is one of the most compelling debut releases by a young artist. Keep your eyes (and ears) wide open for MURALI CORYELL.

Karen Leipziger