ThebandIvory

“Anthropocene”

From his first cloudy memories of Amazonian farmland and blurred faces, Frankie DeRosa – the creative force behind ThebandIvory – knew there was a cosmic secret that surrounded him.

Though the memories of Venezuela are cloudy, the flight to America is clear. With many questions left unanswered, Frankie and his mother were pulled into an American family that, while supportive of his creative nature, forced them to abandon their cultural heritage and ignore the trauma they fled. After years of exploitation of his talents, an ugly divorce left him with his manipulative, emotionally abusive adopted father, separating him from the only reminder of his roots. Dreading not seeing his mother for years at a time, Frankie armed himself with music and art as his coping mechanism. Though they both suffered depression in their own ways, Frankie says, “I knew this was the only way to be seen in a country that overlooks people who look and sound like me.”
 
“Cloaked in white privilege,” Frankie landed at Berklee College of Music, where he began to shed his facade (literally – there were hair clippers involved) and dove headfirst into Indian, Middle Eastern and Carribean music ensembles, finding his “tribe” in the diversity of these groups and unknowingly drawing the connection of art and music, animals, and nature with his cultural and ancestral lineage. At Berklee, Frankie crossed paths with Robbie Simmons. A two-fold partnership began as ThebandIvory was born (Frankie and Robbie got married in 2019 – at their own show).
 
ThebandIvory’s debut album Anthropocene is the journey of Frankie DeRosa’s healing himself from a lifetime of wounds. Anthropocene represents shedding a life’s worth of pain and being born anew. “I want to bring my tribe with me on this journey. The tribe who is also hurting and lost and need to reintroduce themselves to their truth.”

ThebandIvory is:
Frankie DeRosa : Vocals, Strings, Alto Flute
Robbie Simmons: Guitar, Piano, Vocals
Jesse Griffith: Drums
Nick Morolda: Bass