The New Year is off to an auspicious start! La Letra del Año has confirmed that the world will not end in 2012, and even more importantly, Tirso Duarte will be making his first NYC appearance on March 2nd at S.O.B.s! Ladies and gentlemen, timberas y timberos, this is truly a magnificent event so don't miss it, or you will never forgive yourself! We will get back to you ASAP with more US tour dates.

Tirso is an infinitely talented pianist, composer and arranger, and for the younger generation he is the new voice of timba. During his brilliant career he has written and arranged many of the hits of the post-break-up Charanga Habanera before moving on to NG La Banda and Pupy y Los Que Son Son, finally making his mark on Cuban music as a solo artist. As you can tell I am a huge fan myself. Here is a small taste from the Sons of Cuba DVD which many of you have already seen, but it merits watching over and over again...Manos pa'rriba la gente de la noche y la luna llena .

Tirso Duarte sings "La Luna"

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El Zorro is one of the most prolific timberos of Europe. With five CDs to his name, trombonist, composer, arranger and vocalist El Zorro has a rich repertoire to draw on. He has recorded with many of today's biggest names in Cuba such as Ángel Bonne, Sinsonte, Mayito Rivera, Arnaldo Jimenez, Ulises Benevides, Serio Noroña, Roberto Linares and Aisar Hernández to name a few. El Zorro y Su Clan recently put on a great show for their Swiss fans at the jazz club Moods, an important venue for both jazz and Latin music in Zürich. A 14+ minute video potpourri of the concert has been uploaded to YouTube. Check it out, pass it on and see if we can't get the venue owners to set up a nice summer tour across Europe for El Zorro y Su Clan.

El Zorro y Su Clan @ Moods

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Once again I am amazed and confounded by the Cuba - Sweden connection. In a country where the entire population is only equivalent to New York City, we have now at least 8 timba bands that all produce original material at an international level. In addition there are a couple of groups that are currently doing timba covers and several son groups. I still don't know why Swedish musicians seem to be so attracted to timba, but why look a gift horse in the mouth? I just enjoy the fruits of their labors.

The newest timba group in Stockholm is so new it doesn't even have a name but it does have two original singles. Under the direction of 21-year old pianist Jonas Pomo and with the lovely Cecilia Ferrer on lead vocals, they are bringing timba fans a soulful timba. Jonas does the arrangements and he and Cecilia have worked on the lyrics together.

The first single “No Tiene Caso” is at Soundcloud now and will be released on iTunes and Spotify in early December. The second single, “Toco Fondo”, will be out in January.

I did a short interview with Jonas where he answered questions about his background, the singles and the sello of the band, which is currently just going under his name. Click here to read the interview.

Click here to listen to the single “No Tiene Caso”

Bandmembers: 
Jonas Pomo, piano & coros
Cecilia Ferrer, lead vocals
Pablo Cepeda, coros
Whitney Hernandez, coros
Linus Svanberg, congas
Magnus Almqvist, drums & timbales
Viktor Nyberg, bass
Simon Monserrat, güiro
Johan Nordfeldt, trumpet
Rickard Lindgren, trumpet
Peter Fredriksson, trombone
Lisa Bodelius, trombone
photo right: Cecilia Ferrer

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The 2011 Latin Festival in Copenhagen will take place November 5th at Amager Bio. The bands this year are Manolito y Su Trabuco and El Micha . This event is highly recommended! The Trabuco is in top form right now with a selection of great new songs, so they are really worth seeing una vez más . The Trabuco concert is from 9:00pm-10.30pm. It will be followed by 30 minutes of dance shows and then El Micha will close the evening with a concert from 11:30pm-00:30. El Micha is hugely popular among reggaetoneros and has done a number of timbaton songs such as with Issac Delgado, La Charanga Habanera and Alain Daniel. You can get all the information at the Latin Festival website . Note that if you don't buy your ticket in advance they will only accept cash at the door!

Here is a little taste of something new by El Trabuco, a song written by Alexander Abreu and sung by Mayami that has Gabriel from Yemayá's verse raving! Check her blog for more estrenos direct from Havana. Now that she's back, she starting to upload.

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