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OMAR SOSA AFREECANOS QUARTET Rose & Alfred Miniaci Performing Arts Center Tickets: 877.311.SHOW (Toll-free) or purchase online HERE.
Born in Camagüey, Cuba in 1965, Omar grew up listening to his father’s records that included European classical music, some Nat King Cole, but considerable indigenous Cuban music. The group Los Amigos, playing descargas, was his introduction to Latin jazz and Omar was touched profoundly by the music’s freedom and eloquence. By age eight, he was studying percussion, particularly marimba, and displayed sufficient talent to warrant conservatory training, first in Camagüey and then at Escuela Nacional de Musica in Havana, where he studied piano (because marimba was not taught). Later he advanced to Havana’s prestigious Instituto Superior de Arte.
The Afreecanos Quartet is composed of Mr. Sosa on keyboards, Mozambican bassist Childo Tomas, American drummer Marque Gilmore (not to be confused with Marcus Gilmore - see Nicolas Payton concert page), and Senegalese vocalist-percussionist Mola Sylla.
Funding for South Florida JAZZ is provided in part by a grant from the Broward County Board of County |
Electric and eclectic accurately describe the music of Omar Sosa, the three-time Grammy-nominated Cuban composer and pianist, as he continues to explore the African roots of music throughout the Diaspora, while employing modern jazz harmonies and traditional and modern-day instrumentation. Historically, his ensembles and recordings tend to fuse the folkloric with the contemporary, the ancestral with the urban - all with a purely Latin jazz heart and mentality.
