photo credit: Joe Conzo, Jr. |
Bobby Sanabria – drummer, percussionist,
composer, arranger,
recording artist, and educator – has performed
with a veritable
Who’s Who in the world of jazz and Latin music,
as well as with
his own critically acclaimed ensemble, Ascensión.
His diverse
recording and performing experience includes work with
such legendary figures as Dizzy Gillespie, Tito Puente,
Paquito
D’Rivera, Charles McPherson, Mongo Santamaría,
Chico
O’Farrill, Henry Threadgill, and Mario Auza. A
Grammy-nominated solo artist, Bobby Sanabria is a leading
force in bringing the Afro-Cuban tradition into the 21st
century.
Bobby was awarded “Percussionist
of the Year” in 2005 by the readers of DRUM! magazine.
Video
Interview with Bobby SanabriaIncluding
footage from Bobby's "Big Band Urban Folktales" recording
session!
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In 2001, Bobby's
mainstream Grammy nominated CD, "Live & In
Clave!!!" took
the Afro-Cuban big band jazz
tradition into the 21st century. Now he expands
on
that tradition with his highly anticipated new
release
- BIG BAND URBAN FOLKTALES (Jazzheads
JH1156).
Bobby
and his virtuosic big band take the music into
the
future with jaw dropping interpretations of the
music
of Frank Zappa, Hermeto Pascoal, as well as a variety
of other new compositions re-defining the art of
the
big band and the role of the drummer in jazz. Bobby
is
featured here as composer, arranger and performs
on
drums, vibes, marimba and a variety of percussion.
Bobby states, "I'm proud to say this recording
represents my best work to date. It's an incredible
journey for the listener and as Robert Farris
Thompson, who wrote the liner notes states; this
new
CD "...explores an ultimate fusion of jazz,
rock, R&B, mambo, samba, bomba, the blues and
other fine
sounds. It is big band music that treats the world
equally with no boundaries, like Mario Bauzá,
like Don
Ellis, like Afrika Bambataa."
For more information and sound
samples, please visit Bobby's official website:
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Available NOW from iTunes,
In stores on the JazzHeads label 6/5/07
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Bobby, the son of Puerto Rican parents, was born and
raised in
the “Fort Apache” section of New York City’s
South Bronx.
Inspired and encouraged by Maestro Tito Puente, another
fellow New York-born Puerto Rican, Bobby “got
serious” and
attended Boston’s Berklee College of Music from
1975 to 1979,
obtaining a bachelor of music degree. He received their
prestigious Faculty Association Award for his work
as an
instrumentalist.
Since his graduation, Bobby has become
a
leader in the Afro-Cuban and jazz fields as both drummer
and
percussionist and is recognized as one of the most
articulate
scholars of la tradición. He has been featured on
numerous
Grammy-nominated albums, including The
Mambo Kings and
other movie soundtracks, and numerous television and
radio
jingles. His most critically praised work has been
with the
famed Mario Bauzá and his Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra.
With
them he has recorded three Grammy nominated CDs,
considered to be the definitive works of the Afro-Cuban
big-band jazz tradition.
Mr. Sanabria was also featured
with the
Mario Bauza orchestra in two PBS documentaries about
Bauza;
he also appeared on the Bill Cosby show. He appeared
prominently in a PBS documentary on the life of Mongo
Santamaria and on camera in the CBS television movie
Rivkin:
Bounty Hunter. Mr. Sanabria has been the recipient
of many
awards, including an NEA grant as a jazz performer,
various
Meet the Composer awards, and the INTAR off-Broadway
composer award. Most recently he has received the Mid-Atlantic
Foundation Arts Connect Grant for three successive
years.
In 1993 Mr. Sanabria and Ascensión released their
CD, NYC
Aché! on Flying Fish Records. The album contains many
tunes
he has composed and/or arranged, tracing the rhythms
from
their African roots to the sounds of New York City.
It received
worldwide acclaim and garnered four and half stars
in Down
Beat magazine, as well as receiving a nomination for
best
record of the year by the National Association of Independent
Record Distributors (NAIRD). In June 2000 Bobby released
Afro-Cuban Dream... Live & In Clave!!! on the Arabesque
label.
Recorded live at Birdland in New York City, it features
Bobby
powering a big bead of twenty all-stars.
The critically acclaimed album has been hailed by both
the jazz
and Latin music cognoscenti as a masterpiece, and nominated
for a Grammy as the Best Latin Jazz Album of 2001.
Afro-Cuban
Dream...Live & In Clave!!! was also nominated
for the Jazz
Journalists Association 2001 Award for the Best Afro-Cuban
Jazz Album of the Year. His recording ¡Quarteto
Aché!,
released October 2002 on the Khaeon World Music label,
documents Bobby’s virtuosity and hailed a “classic” by
Modern
Drummer magazine.
In addition to being Chair of IAJE’s Afro-Cuban
Jazz Resource
Team, Mr. Sanabria is rounding out his tenth year as
an
Associate Professor at the New School University and
since
1999, Professor at Manhattan School of Music.
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