A \u201cgriot\u201d is defined as an oral storyteller in West Africa, the roots of the tradition tracing back centuries. Nashville-based duo Louis York not only bring this tradition into the modern era with their debut album, American Griots, <\/em>but prove they\u2019ve long been griots themselves.<\/p>\n

The journey begins with Claude Kelly and Chuck Harmony, Grammy nominated songwriters and producers who spent more than a decade writing era-defining pop hits (Kelly wrote \u201cParty in the U.S.A.\u201d by Miley Cyrus and Bruno Mars\u2019 \u201cGrenade,\u201d while Harmony penned Rihanna\u2019s \u201cRussian Roulette\u201d and produced Ne-Yo\u2019s six-time Grammy nominated album, Year of the Gentleman<\/em>). After breaking away from the grind of the mainstream music industry, they created Louis York and launched their own artist collective, Weirdo Workshop, in Franklin, Tennessee (just outside of Nashville) in 2017. Deriving their namesake from Kelly\u2019s native New York and Harmony\u2019s home city of St. Louis, Louis York introduced themselves as a genre-defying act with an important message to share on a succession of EPs: 2015\u2019s Masterpiece Theater – Act I<\/em>, 2016’s Masterpiece Theater – Act II<\/em>, and finally, Masterpiece Theater – Act III<\/em>, released in 2017.<\/p>\n