Hey guys!
Here's today's (Sunday, 7/11/04) NEW YORK TIMES article about Yosi:

NJ section, coulmn called:
BY THE WAY:
A Fan Base That Dances, Claps and Naps
Better judgment may tell you to steer clear of a guy named Yosi with a
guitar slung over his shoulder, but there is no need.
Tribes of drippy new-agers do not trail Yosi, an Island Heights musician.
Two-year-olds do.
"They're funny," Yosi said after a recent Point Pleasant Concert for a
crowd of clapping preschoolers. "They're actually star-struck by me. They'll
say, 'Oh, we'll see you next week at the Ocean County Library show.' They
know my schedule better than I do."
Little wonder. The June release of "Under a Big Bright Yellow Umbrella."
Yosi's third whimsical, genre-spanning CD for 2-to-9-year-olds, which is
holding at No. 11 (down from its peak of No. 2) on the XM Satellite Radio
Childrens' chart has won him honors including the Film Advisory Board's award of
excellence. His success coincides with a schedule that most artists would
call
crazy. In addition to distributing the CD himself, this year Yosi will play
450 shows from New York to Virginia, most of them scattered around New Jersey.
"I'll do three or four shows a day sometimes," said Yosi, whose full name is
Yosi Levin. That can include "three festivals or a couple of private parties
and a library show."
At his shows, the barely-out-of-Papmers set peppers him with requests
for "Hole in the Ground," a bouncy number about the burning desire to be a
worm, or the hard-luck, smoky "Stinky Blues," for which his normally even-keeled
voice goes gravely. He's a casual Fridays kind of performer who dons a theme
outfit only when it's called for.
It is a lifestyle, he said, that he can barely believe he lucked into.
"Seven years ago, when my daughter was 3, I brought my guitar into her
preschool" - Toms River Nursery School - " and the director liked it so much
she
gave me a tuition reduction to keep coming in and playing. From there it just
mushroomed."
New Gods, the Punk outfit he led from 1985 to 1989, while he was a
Rutgers student, had little effect as a lunch pad, he said. He became a
counselor
to the emotionally disturbed. "It just fizzled. I had no idea I'd ever do
anything with music," he said.
The career switch has been met with across-the-board thumbs-up from his
own four children, ages 2 through 10.
"Even the 10-year-old still likes it," he said proudly. "She's not the type
of kid to put on airs. She doesn't have to be cool."


Tammy La Groce





Yosi
YosiMusic.com
YosiMusic, LLC
PO Box 354
Is. Hts., NJ 08732


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