The summer tour of Pupy y Los Que Son Son was delayed due to paperwork issues that kept them from receiving their visas in time, but better late than never. They are now in Europe and will perform tonight in Paris at New Morning.

Pupy y los que son son - No te dejé por mala - El Noro on lead vocals

We have published a list of confirmed dates for Manolito y Su Trabuco who will be tourng in August. I am thrilled to see that they will be playing in Sweden and Gothenburg's annual Kulturkalaset in Kungstorget on August 16th. That is where I will be! They have more dates pending confirmation so check their Tours page again at the end of July. Manolito is currently working on the new CD "Sin Freno" but it won't be out in time for the tour.

Lázaro "Mayami" Díaz sings the title track from the coming CD "Sin Freno"
lyrics by Alexander Abreu

This year Kulturkalast is a gold mine for fans of Cuban music. X Alfonso will play there on August 17th. If you are en inveterate Timba Geek and don't know X Alfonso's work, he is known for intelligent, profound lyrics combined with a hiphop/soul/funk music, and his videos are always full of beautiful imagery. I'll just let his music and his moving lyrics speak for themselves. We have posted the confirmed dates for his tour which for now are focused on Northern Europe. But there is also more to come in X tour plans so stay tuned!

X Alfonso "De Corazón"

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Maykel Blanco y Salsa Mayor continue to demonstrate why they are one of the most popular acts in timba today with a concert in Rome on Friday. The European Tour is winding down so if you have a chance to catch a flight to Rome, don't hesitate. I've followed this band for five years now and they just keep getting hotter and hotter. The singer line-up is excellent and the band is tighter than ever. The final concert of the tour will be Saturday in Viareggio, and then the band returns to Cuba to finish their new CD. There's nothing like live video to bring it all home to you so enjoy the video from the Zouka Cuba festival in Laudun, France.

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Good news timba fans! Sweden's youngest timba band is currently back in the studio working on their first album, and tomorrow CubanNight @ Kägelbanan at Södra Teatern in Stockholm will host the second show by Orquesta Pomo .

I caught their debut performance at Mosebacke on April 15, 2012 and was very impressed. Director, pianist and arranger Jonas Pomo has made a point of handpicking the musicians and then sticking to his guns, no matter the cost. The results speak for themselves. I filmed the April concert, but due to technical difficulties and aging equipment, I have not been able to download the video from the mini-DV cassette where it sits patiently waiting. DJs in Europe and South America have been less patient, and I have had repeated requests for audio or video from that show. Sorry guys...still nothing to share with you.

But in the meantime let me say that the band is very well-rehearsed and boasts a smokin' horn section. Carlos Pérez is currently in Cuba, but Peter Fredriksson and Niklas Viisanen are on trombone and the trumpet section consists of Yuliesky Gonzales, Oslen Ceballo, Johan Nordefeldt and Rickard Lindgren. At the April concert we were treated to solos by all of the horn players that left the audience cheering.

In addition to being beautiful and having a rich voice, lead singer Cecilia Ferrer is charismatic and professional. One thing I noticed was that there wasn't a lot of "muela". The performance was geared towards dancers with smooth transitions between songs. But I think the best way for you to get an idea of what the debut concert was like is to watch some video; this was recorded on an iPhone I believe. Enjoy!

"El Juego" - Orquesta Pomo @ Mosebacke 15 April 2012

You can keep up with the latest news about Orquesta Pomo at Facebook .
The line-up for tomorrow's concert is:
Jonas Pomo, piano
Cecilia Ferrer, lead vocals
Aksel Friberg, bass
Linus Svanberg, congas
Magnus Almqvist, drums & timbales
Jonas Landolsi, güiro
Cristian Guerra, vocals
Alex Saltell, vocals
Cristina Pomo, vocals
Yuliesky Gonzalez, trumpet
Oslen Ceballo, trumpet
Johan Nordefeldt, trumpet
Rickard Lindgren, trumpet
Peter Fredriksson, trombone
Nikolas Viisanen, trombone

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Verse 3 - A Concert Against All Odds - by Bill Tilford

Story and photos by Bill Tilford, all rights reserved
(para leer en español oprima aquí)

When Saturday arrived, I knew that I wasn’t going to try to do the VIP “Meet & Greet” with the fans. For one thing, as a writer, I have learned over the years that it really is better for my own blood pressure to let the regular fans have their own time at those things. For another, I had no idea where and when it would be. (I later learned that it was in the Rooftop 760 section of the club complex.) 

I did want to see the sound check, and after some effort and assistance, I was able to get into the club around 5 PM.  (There was still no noticeable poster outside the entrance to the club. Did someone decide that the event was top secret?)  I saw a few microphones and an engineer who was eagerly awaiting musicians and instruments. No musicians, no disc jockey, no sound, no sound check, just an engineer and equipment eagerly awaiting something to happen. As 6 pm approached, things didn’t look much different. Since the show was supposed to start at 6, this was not a good thing. More time passed. No real crowd was coming in either. One of the club’s staff, a brave young fellow named Denis, finally decided that there really should be music one way or another. By his own account, he was not a disc jockey and knew nothing about Cuban music but did know how to operate almost all of the equipment in the club including the DJ equipment. Heroically, he began assembling a downloaded playlist in the booth so that the audience would at least have something to dance to until the bands came in.  By this time, there was no escaping the fact that this concert was going to start – sometime - without a sound check by the engineer standing near me.  Bad sound can ruin even the best bands and sometimes has when bands from Cuba have performed in the United States, so I began mentally preparing myself for an impending disaster.    

...Testing, zero, zero, zero...

As the crowd began trickling in, music began playing from the DJ booth.....click HERE to read Bill Tilford's full report on the New York Timba Mega Concert

De La Habana a New York Concert Review - by Rosy Estrada

June 16, 2012 - Despite a very late start, mass confusion about the VIP tickets, and technical sound difficulties, the only thing that saved De La Habana a New York from becoming a Mega disaster was the pleasure the audience drew from watching the pure raw energy pour out of the musicians.  Bamboleo, Pupy Pedroso, and Manolito delivered an engaging performance in a rare appearance of all three groups at the famed Copacabana in New York City.

As the Washington, D.C. Timba.com correspondent and organizer of Distrito Cubano, DC's only Cuban social group, it seemed quite logical for me to organize and encourage a group of Cuban music followers/friends from our nation's capitol to travel to NY to soak in some live Cuban music.  What I didn't know was how much the lack of communication from the concert's organizers would affect my overall enjoyment of the concert.  Having attended both very successful Cuban concerts from visiting artists and others not so well promoted in the DC area, I still haven't been able to properly discern the root causes of what seems to be developing into a pattern and practice of over-promising and underdelivering when it comes to U.S. timba concert peformances.

In our case, we ended up purchasing the VIP Meet and Greet tickets....click HERE to read Rosina Estada's full report on the New York Timba Mega Concert

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