The Philadelphia Jazz Project and WRTI are partnering to present a very special concert featuring the Philadelphia premiere of Letieres Leite & Orkestra Rumpilezz, with guests Arturo O'Farrill & Steve Bernstein, and Another Holiday For Skins w/Pablo Batista, Mike Boone, Luke Carlos O'Reilly, and others. Don't miss this unique experience of hearing Afro-Brazilian percussion in Big Band Jazz style!
Friday, July 31st, at 7:30 pm at TPAC/Temple Performing Arts Center, 1837 N. Broad Street, Philadelphia, PA 19122. Tickets $10 in advance / $15 at the door. Order tickets here.
Hailing from Bahia, Brazil, the percussion and woodwinds ensemble, Letieres Leite & Orkestra Rumpilezz embark on its U.S. debut tour featuring the group in concert with special guests in New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Santa Cruz, San Jose, and Miami, between July and August 2015.
Wedding rhythmic Afro-Bahian roots-music to Jazz harmonization is the musical proposal of Letieres Leite & Orkestra Rumpilezz. Founded in 2006 by saxophonist, composer and bandleader, Letieres Leite, the Rumpilezz is "governed" by the rigor of African-Bahian percussion and marked by the influence of jazz. The Orkestra is considered a "break the barriers of Brazilian instrumental music" by journalists. The group has won the Bravo Award! for Best Popular Album and Brazilian Music Award as Revelation and Best Instrumental Group.
Featuring a meeting between African-Brazilian culture, African-Latin music and American Jazz, the Orkestra Rumpilezz tour will promote an unprecedented dialogue between the group and other American musical masters.
"For us, the Rumpilezz, it will be a time of very important dialogue...make the music happen as entertainment, but also as observation and study, "explains Letieres.
Among those special guests invited to participate in the concerts, are exponents of African-Latin musical tradition, African-Caribbean and Jazz, such as Afro-Cuban Jazz pianist and bandleader Arturo O'Farrill and trumpeter and musical adventurer, Steven Bernstein, who will perform with the Orkestra in Philadelphia. The tour is an unprecedented rapprochement between Latin music and African culture (African-Brazilian, African-Bahian and African-Latin) with Jazz.
The opening act for the evening will be the Philly-based, Art Blakey-inspired percussion ensemble, Another Holiday for Skins with Pablo Batista, Luke Carlos O'Reilly and others. Another Holiday For Skins performed in February at the International House to a sold-out crowd featuring an all-star ensemble of Philadelphia drummers, percussionists and other musicians. This event was a celebration of the classic 1958 Art Blakey album, Holiday For Skins and its sister projects, Drum Suite and Orgy In Rhythm. Recorded by master drummer, Art Blakey, who was joined by Philly Joe Jones, Sabu Martinez, Ray Bryant and others, Holiday For Skins was an early exploration of what we now call “World Music.”