Singer/songwriter/musician Sylvia Black may have moved away from NYC a while ago, but she left at least part of her heart in the East Village — specifically at Nublu, where she played a seasonably spooky set last week.
With a fine band that included Ari Bortnik (guitar), Yusuke Yamamoto (vibes), Jacquelene Acevedo (percussion) and Kevin Shea (drums), Black filled out two sets with a mix of originals and covers that was perfect for the days leading up to Halloween.
Mixing perfectly chosen covers such as “Touch the Leather” and “I Put a Spell on You” (the latter recently featured on the hit show “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina”) with originals, Black’s gothic funk went down well with an audience of longtime fans and new converts.
Black’s musical journey began in the fourth grade in Texas, when she discovered her own taste in music. With the help of her babysitter (whose boyfriend was in The Romantics), she was introduced to bands like Missing Persons and her stepdad, whose “huge record collection” led to her getting into “Frank Zappa and a lot of rock stuff.”
She delved into MTV back when the network focused on music videos and developed a crush on Van Halen’s David Lee Roth at the age of eight. Moving along, she fell in love with Devo in sixth grade and did a report for an eighth-grade class on the B-52s.
A small part in the musical “Hair” (performed in a bar) led to her first job: singing in a band in a resort town in Japan, with a schedule that only a 17-year-old could love.
“I was singing in a hotel, two shows a night, every night, one day off a month! On our day off, we’d go to Tokyo. … I used to jog through the Green Hills listening to Devo’s “Greatest Misses” and Rush, and that was it.”
Her musical experience up to then had consisted of playing the piano and violin, but she didn’t take either seriously. At one point, she thought she’d play the drums, but when the desired drum kit didn’t show up for Christmas — she got a practice pad instead — she thought, “I guess I’ll try the bass, it’s interesting.”
“I didn’t really understand what it was, but I thought, we’ll see what happens. I soon found out,” Black recalls.
Owing to the fact that she was “a little shy and introverted,” she spent a lot of time practicing alone rather than playing in bands as a teen because, she admits, “I didn’t have the balls! I was kind of solitary.”
The practice paid off, though, as she ultimately received a scholarship to the Berklee College of Music in Boston.
“When I found out that you could actually go to college for music, I thought it was the most ridiculous thing,” Black says, “that people could go to an entire school for music. I don’t know why, I just thought that wasn’t an option.”
“Luckily”, she admits, “I got all my drugs and partying out of the way in high school in California, where drugs were part of the curriculum. Mushrooms, acid, raves, whatever. By the time I got to Boston, I felt like an adult. I went out like three times in four years.”
One summer, before graduating from college, Black found herself staying in the East Village and joining a funk/soul band called Coffee. But after college, she “stopped playing bass for a while. I just stopped playing for many, many years. I didn’t have a mentor; I didn’t have anyone to show me the ropes. I couldn’t find my people- it took me a long time.”
Even a dinner alone with Prince didn’t amount to anything — although, she recalls, he did take the time to warn her about the music business.
Once she returned, she hasn’t stopped. Collaborating on hit songs (“Meet Me Halfway” by the Black Eyed Peas), playing in Maya Rudolph’s Prince tribute band (called, what else?, Princess), writing with Moby, performing with Telepopmusik and playing everywhere from a residency with her band Kudu at the original Nublu to a festival in France where she was onstage in front of 20,000 people.
Black fondly recalls her time at Nublu, saying that “Nublu is a home. I love Ilhan (Ersahin, the club’s founder). He nurtured our first band and took us to Turkey, where he released our Kudu album on his label, circa 2005. I am always grateful to him and everyone who worked there, making it our second home. It was a wild time!”
Although Black is solidly a solo artist, she doesn’t mind sharing the stage with talented peers, in this case, the extraordinary Joseph Keckler, who shared vocals on “Bela Lugosi’s Dead.”
“He has that deep voice that I knew would be perfect,” Black explains. “We’re good friends, and it’s fun to have friends along. He’s a great writer, storyteller, opera singer, performer and person.”
Black also receives kudos from her band members, such as Grammy award-winning percussionist Acevedo, whose résumé includes recent collaborations with David Byrne on Broadway and Stevie Wonder at the Met Gala.
“Playing with Sylvia is great because she is endlessly creative and interested in exploring all the musical spaces,” Acevedo tells us.
With a new album coming out called “SHADOWTIME” in January 2026, Black muses about how she’s “reliving my goth phase” that she went through as a teen in Cupertino, CA.
“Those influences are coming back to my music, but it’s all a patchwork,” she says. “It’s danceable, still in the goth, new wave, new romantic arena. I’m always trying to capture the moment that I’m in. My life has been very varied, I’ve moved a lot, I’ve met a lot of different kinds of people, and I’ve travelled the world since I was little, so my influences come from all over the place. Almost everything I do is going to have an air of darkness about it, but I’m still trying to find the perfect song that makes me happy. I’ve given everything, my whole life, to music.”
Sylvia Black is online at sylviablackmusic.com, and her Instagram is @sylviablackmusic.
She will be appearing next on Nov. 19 at Nublu at 62 Avenue C.
