Snarky Puppy closes the 30th edition staging the only three concerts announced by the band in Europe

• The public square of Santa Ana & Puerto de la Cruz (Lago Martiánez) will experience their own end of festivities between Thursday 22 & Sunday 25
• Liv Warfield, Jean Paul Estiévenart Quintet, Jose James, Ozma, Kike Perdomo Sextet, Brooklyn Funk Essentials, Yone Rodríguez Sextet & the Gino Marcelli Trio complete the programme for this final weekend

The American ensemble Snarky Puppy, led by Michael League, will close 30th Festival Internacional Canarias Jazz & Más staging three concerts which will be held at the Tenerife Auditorium (Thursday 22, 20:00 hours, entrances sold-out), El Salinero Theatre, in Arrecife (Friday 23, 20:00 hours, last few tickets on sale) & Alfredo Kraus Auditorium (Saturday 24, 19.00 hours, last few tickets on sale). Considered as one of the most refreshing groups on the contemporary musical scene, they will close an edition that has covered the eight islands and has managed to place ‘sold-out’ placards at almost all its venues –public squares, auditoriums & theatres-, respecting the health safety protocols & capacity limitations, while offering a billing of top level artists. This weekend the final great party will be staged at the Public Square of Santa Ana (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria) & Puerto de la Cruz (Tourist Complex Costa Martiánez).

Snarky Puppy will present numbers from their latest disc, Immigrance (GroundUP Music). “The idea here is that everything is fluid, that everything is always moving and that we’re all in a constant state of immigration,” explains Michael League. “Obviously the album’s title is not without political undertones, but Immigrance doesn’t aim to scold or condescend; rather, its mission is one of uplift, a testament to what humanity can achieve when cultures are able to come together without fear”.

The album’s rhythmic component is rooted in a ground-breaking strategy: drummers Jamison Ross, Jason ‘JT’ Thomas & Larnell Lewis share sections of each composition, without overlapping. Immigrance is a studio project, and it features most of the same musicians. And though it shares that project’s ace musicianship and dynamic, kinetic spirit, it is also rawer and moodier than its predecessor. Several of the compositions put a newfound emphasis on delivering simpler, streamlined impact.

En Immigrance, Snarky Puppy practica en esencia lo que predica todo el tiempo. La banda en sí es una representación de lo que trata de expresar musicalmente, explica League, “que personas de diferentes lugares pueden aportar sus diversas fortalezas y experiencias, y lo hermoso y cohesionado que eso puede ser”. Después de una década de incesantes giras y grabaciones, el colectivo formado en Texas por Michael League en 2003 y compuesto por cerca de 25 músicos se encontró de repente considerado por la prensa y el público como una de las principales figuras del mundo del jazz. En esta última década ha logrado tres premios Grammy (Mejor interpretación de R&B en 2014, y Mejor álbum instrumental contemporáneo en 2016 y 2017), categorías que demuestran que Snarky Puppy no es exactamente una banda de jazz.

With Immigrance, Snarky Puppy is essentially practicing what it’s preached all along. “The band itself is a representation of that musical expression”, explains League, “that people from different places can bring their various strengths and experiences, and that can be beautiful and cohesive”. After a decade of incessant tours & recordings, the group formed in Texas by Michael League in 2003 and consisting of close to 25 musicians suddenly found itself considered by both the press & public as one of the main figures in the world of jazz. In this last decade they have won three Grammy Awards (Best R&B Performance in 2014 and Best Contemporary Instrument Album in 2016 & 2017), categories which prove that Snarky Puppy isn’t exactly a jazz band.

PUBLIC SQUARE SANTA ANA

Thursday 22: Liv Warfield & Simbeque Project (20.00 hours)

Friday 23: Jean-Paul Estiévenart Quintet, Kike Perdomo Sextet & José James (20.00 hours)

Saturday 24: OZMA & Brooklyn Funk Essentials (21.00 hours)

 PUERTO DE LA CRUZ (TOURIST COMPLEX COSTA MARTIÁNEZ)

Friday 23: Brooklyn Funk Essentials & Liv Warfield (20.00 hours).

Saturday 24: Yone Rodríguez Sextet, Jean Paul Estiévenart Quintet & José James (20.00 hours)

Sunday 25: OZMA & Gino Marcelli Trio.

Attending a Liv Warfield show is like watching Tina Turner, Sade and James Brown all in one, a memorable experience. Her powerful voice and enormous stage presence have been key as to why over the course of her career she has worked alongside icons like Lionel Richie, Cyndi Lauper, Nancy Wilson & Prince himself. Born in Peoria, Illinois, she was part of Prince’s New Power Generation and as of since the year 2016 she is with Roadcase Royale, a band formed with Nancy Wilson, Ryan Waters (a proteg’e of Prince & Warfield’s musical director for her solo performances), Chris Joyner, keyboard player of ‘Heart’, bassist Dan Rothchild and drummer Ben Smith.

Simbeque Project completes its trilogy of a tribute to Canarian folklore with its recorded disc in which its new arrangements reveal the band’s maturity & enhancement. Once more, paying special attention to the purest sounds of the native folklore and blending it with jazz, rock, funk, electronic, drum & bass, Simbeque Project continues establishing a generational bridge, always defending the idea of contemporaneity of our folklore and of its internationalisation.

Since the year 2013, Jean-Paul Estiévenart has been offering unpretentious music: for his trio the bare minimum for trumpet / bass / drums, music in which only he plays the melodies. For his new ensemble, he has added harmonic instruments (piano, guitar) to set the “sound stage” for his trumpet: pianist Nicola Andrioli & guitarrist Romain Pilon are also great improvisers. Nicolas Thys & Antoine Pierre (who were with them on ‘TaxiWars’ and the quartet ‘Harcsa / Gyemant’) join the rhythm section. The music of the quintet, although more substantial than that of the trio, maintains one of Estievenart’s better musical qualities: its sobriety.

Kike Perdomo is the most prolific of Canarian jazz musicians with 12 CDs released, many of them featuring collaborations with international artists of the calibre of Bill Evans, Chuck Loeb, Josh Dion, Chano Domínguez, Gerardo Nuñez… This latest work of his was recorded between Tenerife & New York just before the nation’s  confinement came into effect. This year he brings a jazz band delving almost into rock, with great soloists & composers from the Canaries, such as David Quevedo, Nico Martín, Andrés Dorado, Daniel González & Nasim López-Palacios.

José James spent a decade reshaping jazz with the genre-blurring verve of a crate-digging beat guru before becoming a solo R&B star. The last couple of years he spent living in Bill Withers’ shoes, recording & touring that legendary songbook for the Lean On Me project. Now, the satin-voiced songwriter’s latest is No Beginning No End 2, a sequel to his 2013 album that resurrects the bold eclecticism we first fell in love with. After touring with Bill Withers, James recalls “I wrote a thing on Instagram saying I was thinking about No Beginning No End 2 and people went insane. They wrote thousands of comments about how the first one changed their life. I don’t sit around and think ‘my work is so important’ so that was kinda nice.”

Over the course of their 27 year career, Brooklyn Funk Essentials have been consolidated as an audacious collective that mixes soul, hip hop, spoken-word, jazz and of course, funk. Following the release of six studio albums, the ‘Essentials’ made their name as absolutely electric artists, thrilling their loyal fans & admirers with performances on all five continents. In 2018, they began recording their most recent disc, Stay Good in Stockholm, Sweden and Birmingham, England and it was released in 2019, registering a million playbacks on Spotify in the first three weeks of its release.

With seven albums to their credit, 450 concerts staged on 4 continents and over 40 countries, OZMA has also formed part of collaborative multi-disciplinary projects with artists from all over the world. So many dialogues and generous exchanges that have continued to feed the work of the musicians that make up the band. Since 2001, OZMA has taken us on journeys, across continents but also musical styles, borrowing largely from rock grammars, traditional music and electronic landscapes. Like a willingness to hear John Coltrane interacting with Rage Against The Machine, Ravi Shankar jamming with Pink Floyd, or Amon Tobin hitching up with the fanfares of New Orleans …

Yone Rodríguez chose the year 2020 to record & release his latest work to date, titled Semilla. The disc has been nominated for the ‘Premios Canarios de la Música’ (Canaries Music Prize) 2021, being a finalist among the three best albums released on the Canary Islands in the past two years in the category ‘Mejor disco de músicas de raíz’ (Best album of Roots Music). Semilla is an album featuring 12 pieces in which the musician from Agaete gathers the fruit of his musical experience and replants them in a musical journey that spans from his roots to the sounds he has been discovering in the course of his career  and where what is catalogued as ‘World Music’.

Born in Sermoneta (Latina, Italy), Gino Marcelli is an active composer, arranger, pianist & producer. He began in music as a child and after studying harmony with the maestro Gianfranco Sordi, played all over Europe with artists such as Leonard Johnson, Gerardina Trova, Andrea Bocelli, Mango, Tricarico, Tony Scott, Simple Minds, Feitless, Trilok Gurtu… In 1989 he moved to Milan, with Stefano Cerri (bass) & Andy Surdi (drums & vocals) forming the trio ‘Cerri Gas Station’. In 1991 he began a collaboration with Aldo, Giovanni & Giacomo. In 1992 & 1993 he composed the music for the theatrical shows Aria di Tempesta featuring the participation of Marina Massironi, under the direction of Paola Galassi.[:]