The Festival Canarias Jazz & Mas heads south staging concerts in Maspalomas and Adeje

• Cyrille Aimée, Patax, Chico Pinheiro, The Black Barbies, Maria Joâo & Carlos Bica Quartet and the Jonay Mesa Quintet are the star features
• The weekend closes at The Paper Club with the performance by Morgan Hernández vs. Fernikhan (Sunday 11th, 15:00 hours)

This weekend, 9 & 10 July, the Festival Internacional Canarias Jazz & Mas packs its gear and heads south, both in Gran Canaria as well as Tenerife. On the one hand, after an absence of eleven years, it consolidates its return to the municipality of San Bartolomé de Tirajana featuring performances by Cyrille Aimée, Chico Pinheiro, Patax and The Black Barbies, at the Faro (Lighthouse) of Maspalomas Esplanade and the Convention Centre of ‘ExpoMeloneras’. And on the other, at the auditorium ‘EMMA’ (Municipal School of Music) in Adeje, concerts staged by Maria Joâo & Carlos Bica Quartet, the Jonay Mesa Quintet, as well as Cyrille Aimée and Patax. Yet again the weekend closes this Sunday 11th with a matinee performance at The Paper Club starting at 15:00 hours, staged by Morgan Hernández vs. Fernikhan. All information relating to the programming and sale of tickets is available on www.canariasjazz.com

A ‘Grammy Award’ nominee, for singer Cyrille Aimée improvisation is not just a vocal technique. It’s a way of life that allows her to share her contagious voice & creative spark with the world, and which has also  taken her towards new directions. Her adventure began in the small town of Samois-sur-Seine in France, where the young Cyrille was introduced to a wealth of diverse music by her French father and Dominican mother, listening to everything from Michael Jackson to French chanson, merengue & Latin salsa. She and her sister would dance around the living room, instilling a gleeful abandon and warm groove that still shines through her music to this day.

Chico Pinheiro is considered to be a prominent figure both within and outside the Brazilean musical scene, as a distinguished guitarrist, composer & arranger. His latest release City of Dreams (2020), was nominated for the Grammy Awards in the ‘Best Latin Jazz Album  Grammy 2021’. Alongside his projects as leader, he also has collaborated with artists such as Placido Domingo, Brad Mehldau, Dave Grusin, Dianne Reeves, Kurt Elling, Danilo Pérez, Nnenna Freelon, Bob Mintzer, Herbie Hancock, Julian Lage &Steve Cardenas, Esperanza Spalding, Ivan Lins, Rosa Passos, Chico César, Ed Motta, Chris Potter, John Patitucci, Lee Ritenour, Ari Hoenig, Peter Erskine, among others.

At present, Patax is the most prominent fusion band in Spain and already known all over the world, continues on an unstoppable career path. Drawing from the legacy of some fusion greats like Weather Report, Corea’s Elektric Band, Herbie Hancock, & Zawinul Syndicate, and without concealing the powerful influence by visionary jazz entities Irakere, Wayne Shorter, Miles Davis, Enrique Morente, Hermeto Pascoal & Paco de Lucía, Patax carries the fusion concept to totally unexplored territory, where a communication between flamenco, funk, jazz and Afro-Cuban rhythms is the key ingredient to their complex, explosive & magical recipe. In Maspalomas they will present their repertoire Patax plays The Beatles (2021), a musical tribute by them to the most influential pop band in history.

The Black Barbies is one of the most original and innovative proposals on the current music scene. This band from Barcelona brings musicians from different backgrounds together, both stylistically and geographically (Spain, Italy, Africa), which is why, from the very first note, they create a sensational, explosive mix of sounds and flavours of the most extraordinary kind. With the powerful voice of Xiluva Tomás at the helm and the musical direction of guitarist Oriol Riart, they also have the funniest and sexiest brass section in the whole of Barcelona. Always with a fresh, catchy and sensual sound, they combine their own songs and versioned hits from all times to the rhythm of jazz, swing, soul & funk.

The Portuguese vocalist Maria João returns to the festival in a duo formation with Carlos Bica, another prestigious Portuguese artist; a collaboration which dates back to the ‘80s, when they recorded the albums Conversa (1986) and Sol (1991). After 10 years of performing together, and with many concerts around the world, they parted ways. Now, after 25 years, they are reunited, accompanied by André Santos (guitar) and João Farinha (keyboards), two of the most talented members of a new generation of Portuguese musicians.

At the ‘Festival Canarias Jazz & Mas’ Jonay Mesa will present his project Colours, a production which draws clearly from jazz and World-Music, with the guitar as the main instrument. The pieces that feature in this are the result of painstaking work of research & composition, since influences of Brazilean, African & the most avant-garde jazz can be appreciated in the same work. In this compositional process one can note above all, the quest for sincerity & musicality. As a result of this, eight compositions full of technical skill, tones, improvisation & good taste have come to light. Here Jonay Mesa has dared to put on record his status as arranger, writing both for the band as well as orchestral strings, something that has brought class & depth to the work.

In this 30th edition, the Festival Canarias Jazz & Mas goes to the eight islands for the first time in the same edition (having already staged concerts on all, but not in the same year), a milestone that is due also to the collaboration of all the institutions that have made it possible to celebrate this musical event: the Canary Islands Government; the Island Councils of Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, La Palma, El Hierro, La Gomera, Tenerife & Gran Canaria (through its Tourist Board); the Town Halls of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Santa Brígida, Teguise, San Bartolomé de Tirajana, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, La Laguna, Puerto de la Cruz, Adeje, Los Llanos de Aridane, San Sebastián de La Gomera; and venues such as the Adán Martín Auditorium of Tenerife, the Auditorium & Theatre Foundation of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Theatre Guiniguada, the place of interest ‘La Granja’, and others that have been added this year, like the Elder Museum of Science & Technology, the Convent of Santo Domingo in La Laguna, the Convention Centre of ‘ExpoMeloneras’ and the Tenerife Nature & Archeology Museum (MUNA).

PROGRAMME:

Friday 9:

Faro (Lighthouse) of Maspalomas Esplanade, 20.00 hours.

Chico Pinheiro Quartet & The Black Barbies.

‘EMMA’ Auditorium, Adeje, 20.00 hours

Cyrille Aimée and Patax.

Saturday 10:

Convention Centre ‘ExpoMeloneras’, 20.00 hours.

Cyrille Aimée

Faro (Lighthouse) of Maspalomas Esplanade, 21.30 hours.

Patax

‘EMMA’ Auditorium, Adeje, 20.00 hours

Jonay Mesa Quintet and Maria Joâo & Carlos Bica Quartet

Domingo 11:

The Paper Club (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), 15.00 hours

Morgan Hernández vs. Fernikhan.[:]