Catalog of artists from the Russian world music label Sketis Music: Russian folk musicians,folklore ensembles and folk groups

Dmitry Novokolsky, the country singer, guitarist and mouth harper was born on 25 January 1973 in Moscow. He started plating music in 1988. At that time he began playing a guitar and writing the first songs. In 1991, in the heat of Perestroika, having adjoined rock'n'roll party which was slowly leaving the underground, he started performing on Arbat with Denis Mazhukov and Oleg Usmanov (ex - "Mr. the Twister"). Two years later he got acquainted with John Anderson (the American diplomat working in Moscow that time) and thanks to this person has become closely acquainted with the blues and learnt to play a lip harmonic. In 1994 he formed an own country-blues B.A.C.K. Group (assisted by the musicians of the first "Off Beat" structure that played in Bravo Group before) which became one of the country-blues pioneers in the post-Soviet period. The debut of this group took place in January 1995 in Arbat Blues Club (this club was created in 1993 by John Anderson and Alexander Tsarkov - the people that started the new life of many blues and rock'n'roll musicians of that time and, as a matter of fact, took this music out from the semiunderground). Besides performances in B.A.C.K. Group Dmitry Novokolsky conducted a cable TV author's program "Doors" (1995-1996). Willy Tokarev, Armen Grigoryan, Alexander F.Sklyar, Valery Syutkin, ballet masters Natalia Kasatkina and Vladimir Vasilyov, Nikolay Arutyunov ("Blues League"), Olga Arefyeva, Kovcheg Group and Mango-Mango Group, etc. In 2000 the Group disintegrated and Dmitry played the lip harmonica for some time in "Off Beat" having taken part in recording of their record "That’s What I Am". In July, 2000 he became a leading vocalist of the Apple Jack country- rock'n'roll group - a unique group in Russia, performing the modern country-rock. They performed in Germany, Denmark, Holland, Poland (the 2nd prize at the festival of Country-Europe in Mrangovo (2003), the USA and Canada and in many Russian cities (Surgut, Novosibirsk, Kostroma, Nizhniy Novgorod, Lipetsk, Kaluga, Ivanovo, Belgorod...). The Group annually participates in Pushchino Festival. Novokolsky has been periodically performing as a session musician with such known groups, as "Off Beat", "Scolder Blues Band", "Dr. Nick", etc. Besides performances in "Apple Jack", he also individually performs or with friends adherents.