Daniel Donato

Native to Nashville, Daniel Donato, at 22 years of age, has acquired a tenure of musicianship that spans 11 years of vast performing and recording experience. Cutting his teeth on Lower Broadway, by first busking on the streets for tips, he then very quickly landed one of the city’s most well known residencies with The Don Kelley Band. Daniel’s name quickly grew around the city and the nation’s guitar scene. He then, at the age of 18, released an internationally published and distributed book and DVD on his philosophy of guitar playing and musicianship with the nation’s best selling publisher of music instructional material, Hal Leonard. His stint with this group received exposure from Southern Living, Garden and Gun, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal. Thousands of hours and thousands of shows in the Honky Tonks of Nashville led Daniel to the influences that make up the dichotomy of his musical sound today such as Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, and Merle Haggard.

“When I was 16, one of the first places I ever drove to by myself was to an east Nashville dive bar to see Sturgill Simpson play to 5 people.” Sturgill’s approach to experimentation of jam music with a basis of country sound is a new door into the genre that Daniel aims to have a strong foot in. The outlaw country energy combined with the free will following of the muse with jam based music is a developing scene with the nucleus being Nashville, Tennessee. Daniel’s first release of music, a 3 song EP titled Modern Machine, is inspired largely by this renaissance, the local color of Daniel’s musical and lifelong home. Written from November 2016 to December of 2017, this collection of music is a picture of time capturing Daniel’s first efforts as a singer and writer, alongside his experienced identity as a guitarist.

Daniel’s touring experience with his own solo endeavors and The Wild Feathers has brought him to 5+ countries and various late night television outlets with Jimmy Kimmel and Seth Meyers. He has also achieved personal praise from musicians John Mayer, Jason Isbell, Sturgill Simpson, Chris Shiflett (Foo Fighters) and Derek Trucks.