Opening Night: Global Cuba Fest 2018

Born in Sancti Spiritus, Cuba, Tony Perez began his jazz training at Cuba’s National School of Arts and is currently considered to be one of Cuba’s most accomplished contemporary musicians. He has performed and recorded with many renowned artists in the Latin American music scene, also leading several Afro-Cuban jazz ensembles with top-name musicians, including such names as Isaac Delgado, Fania Allstars, Celia Cruz, Jose Luis Cortes, and Giraldo Piloto’s group ‘Klimax’, who referred to Perez as “one of the greatest pianists in Cuban music.” In 1998 Mr. Perez was hand-picked by Chucho Váldes to become the pianist for the most internationally renowned Cuban group of all time, ‘Irakere’ and participated in the production of the all-star collaboration “La Rumba Soy Yo,” a recording that won a Grammy in the 2001 Latin Music Awards. His relocation to Boston, MA in the early 21stCentury placed him among the greats in the Boston Berklee Jazz Scene, where he has flexed his jazz muscles playing with local giants. Among his accomplishments, Tony Perez has released two recordings, the 1998 solo-piano disc “Soneao” on Tamarindo Records, and “From Enchantment and Timba to Full Force Jazz,” a sophisticated yet hard-driving collection of Latin Jazz originals released by Pimienta Records in 2005.

Yusa is a Cuban singer and songwriter, born in the Buena Vista district of Havana, Cuba and brought up in East Havana, Yusa’s childhood was cradled by music. She started studying guitar at the age of 6, and completed her musical studies at the Amadeo Roldán Music Conservatory, where she concentrated on a particular type of Cuban guitar called the tres, after which she began performing in small bars and clubs in Havana. Yusa is a multi-instrumentalist who is perfectly at ease playing guitar, bass, keyboard, or percussion instruments. Her voice is also a powerful instrument, and she writes a great deal of her own material. Her music is defined as a young and thoroughly modern musical style laced with funk, jazz, rap, and soul influences, but holding on tightly to its African and Caribbean roots. Yusa is often described as a poet, and her songs expose the personal daily struggles of living in Havana. A master collaborator, Yusa has recorded and performed with top artists working in a variety of musical genres, creating a fresh and sophisticated sound that opens up a new dimension of Cuban music.

Drummer, composer, arranger and producer Horacio “El Negro” Hernandez has been a driving force behind some of the most popular and influential Latin and Latin-fused music of the past two decades. Since leaving Cuba in 1990 his drumming has propelled the efforts of Grammy Award winners Michel Camilo, Roy Hargrove, Chucho Valdes, Gary Burton, Alejandro Sanz and Carlos Santana, as well as Paquito D’Rivera and Gonzalo Rubalcaba. Hernandez is identified by his unique “Latin Fusion” style, melding the folkloric clave with the fierce punch, crisp snap and deep grooves of today’s Jazz, Pop, and Rock.