Omar Sosa is one of the most versatile jazz artists on the scene today: composer, arranger, producer, pianist, percussionist, and bandleader. He fuses a wide range of world music and electronic elements with his native Afro-Cuban roots to create a fresh and original urban sound
Salif Keita (born 25 August 1949) is an internationally recognized Afro-Pop singer and song writer from Mali. He is unique not only because of his reputation as the Golden Voice of Africa, but because he is an albino and a direct descendant of the founder of the Mali Empire, Sundiata Keita. Keita was born on August 25, 1949 in the city of Djoliba. He was outcast by his family and ostracized by the community because he was an albino, a sign of bad luck in Mandinka culture. He left Djoliba for Bamako in 1967, where he joined the government sponsored Super Rail Band de Bamako.
He belongs to one of the great flamenco dynasties, the Habichuelas, and to the generation of Paco de Lucía, Camarón de la Isla, Enrique Morente, Manolo Sanlúcar... which has opened the way for the current generation of young flamencos and whose work has brought about the enormous popularity that this art form enjoys nowadays. From Pepe´s trajectory, it is possible to perceive the surprising evolution of flamenco in the last few years clearly.
Tiken Jah Fakoly (1968) is a reggae singer from Odienné, Côte d’Ivoire. Tiken Jah was born into a family of griots and christened Doumbia Moussa Fakoly on June 23, 1968 in Odienne, north-western Côte d'Ivoire. He discovered reggae at an early age, assembling his first group, Djelys, in 1987. He became well-known at a regional level, but would soon ascend to national recognition. Concerned by the social and political evolution of his country, it was not long before Tiken Jah was writing incisive works on the political environment in Côte d'Ivoire.
LABJACD take their name from the first initials of the seven members in the band and play a style of music not too far removed from The Cat Empire, but with a stronger emphasis on the hip-hop and Latin roots of the music. Two members of the band have Chilean ancestry, and thus many of their lyrics are in Spanish.
Fela Anikulapo Kuti (15 Oct 1938 – 2 Aug 1997), or simply Fela, was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, pioneer of afrobeat music, human rights activist, political maverick & leader of Fela Ransome Kuti & Africa '70. HMV Magazine ranked him #46, on a list of the top-100 most influential musicians, of the 20th century. The musical style performed by Fela Kuti is called Afrobeat, which is essentially a fusion of jazz, funk, psychedelic rock, and traditional African chants and rhythms.
Bob Marley & the Wailers was a reggae band created in 1974 by Bob Marley, after Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer left the precursor band, The Wailers. Bob Marley & The Wailers formed in Kingston, Jamaica and consisted of Bob Marley himself as guitarist, song writer and lead singer, Wailers Band as the backing band and the I Threes as backup vocalists. The band included the brothers Carlton Barrett and Aston "family Man" Barrett on drums and bass respectively, Junior Marvin and Al Anderson on lead guitar, Tyrone Downie and Earl "Wire" Lindo on keyboards, and Alvin "Seeco" Patterson on percussion.
Egberto Amin Gismonti (born December 5, 1947 in Carmo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) is a brazilian composer, guitarist and pianist. Gismonti began his formal music studies at the age of six on piano. After studying classical music for 15 years, he went to Paris to study orchestration and analysis with Nadia Boulanger and the composer Jean Barraqué, a disciple of Arnold Schönberg and Anton Webern. After his return to Brazil, Gismonti began to explore other musical genres.
Cibo Matto is a New York City-based band formed by two Japanese women, Miho Hatori and Yuka Honda in 1994. Despite being based in the US rather than Japan, they have strong links with the shibuya-kei scene in their use of sampling and mixture of trip-hop and rock, but stand out amongst other such artist for their particularly strong use of Latin and South American music. Cibo Matto is an Italian phrase that means "crazy food".