New and noteworthy

01 Saturday Apr 2017

Posted by in Home, In Other Words, Jazz, Latin Jazz, On Music

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The GFS Trio, comprising Indian percussionist Trilok Gurtu, Italian trumpeter Paolo Fresu and Cuban pianist Omar Sosa, headline the just announced Miami International Jazz Festival, April 27-29.

Sosa and Fresu have recorded two albums as a duo, Alma (2012) and Eros (2016), including collaborators such as Brazilian cellist Jacques Morelenbaum and the Egyptian-Belgian vocalist Natacha Atlas, and they have been touring as a trio with Gurtu since 2014. (Check them here at the Ravenna Festival, Italy, a bit earlier, in 2011). This is the trio’s North American tour debut.

For complete lineup and more info check Miami International Jazz Festival.

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The New, The Familiar and The 34th Miami Film Festival

14 Tuesday Mar 2017

Posted by in Home, In Other Words

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This piece appeared on the Knight Foundation blog in March, 2017

The 34th edition of Miami Dade College’s Miami Film Festival, celebrated March 3- 12, was not only a window to the world on film but also a timely showcase for diversity and inclusion, on and off the screen.

The top awards had a distinct Latin accent as “Family Life” (“Vida de Familia”), a Chilean film directed by Cristian Jiménez and Alicia Scherson, won Best Film in the Knight Competition at the Awards Night Gala on Saturday. The award includes a $30,000 cash prize. Daniel Hendler took the prize as Best Director, which carries a $5,000 cash prize, for “The Candidate” (“El Candidato”), from Uruguay; and Lola Amores and Eduardo Martínez shared the Best Actor award, which also has a $5,000 cash prize, for their work on “Santa y Andrés,” from Cuba.

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Josemi Carmona, Javier Colina and a World of Music Beyond Flamenco

08 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in Home, Latin Jazz, On Music

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Javier Colina (left) and Josemi Carmona.
Photo Credit Anya Bartels

This piece was posted by Artburst Miami in March, 2017

 

Guitarist, composer and producer Josemi Carmona embodies the spirit of Nuevo Flamenco. Rooted firmly in tradition, he has proven a restless, curious artist, ignoring the boundaries of genres and collaborating with musicians as disparate as jazz bassist Dave Holland, British Indian musician Nitin Sawhney, Norwegian pianist Bugge Wesseltoft and pop superstar Alejandro Sanz. He was 14 when he joined Ketama, the enormously successful flamenco pop group co-founded by his brother, Juan Carmona. And if an endorsement was still necessary, flamenco virtuoso Paco de Lucía called him “one of the guitarists who will define guitar playing in the 21st century.”

So it’s only fitting that Carmona and Javier Colina, one of the premier and most versatile bassists in Spain, as comfortable in jazz as in flamenco, open the two-concert Flamenco Eñe series at the intimate Carnival Studio Theater at the Arsht Center, Sunday at 7 p.m. The duo, with the addition of percussionist José Ruiz, “Bandolero,” will be performing music from their recently released album De Cerca (Up Close), which includes nods to flamenco, jazz and the Great Latin American Songbook.

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