Bringing work from his latest album, The Rumba Foundation, Jesse Cook heats up the stage at the UTC Fine Arts Center in the middle of winter for an incredible evening of incendiary guitar playing and rhythms from around the world. Cook has ruled the Billboard jazz and world music charts for years - since his Juno Award-nominated DVD Jesse Cook Live at the Metropolis (filmed at the 2007 Montreal Jazz Festival) with his Top 3 single, Café Mocha, and his #1 album Frontiers.
The Rumba Foundation continues the journey Cook has travelled ever since he was first exposed to rumba flamenco while visiting his father in Arles, France. What other teenager can lay claim to jamming with The Gypsy Kings on his fatherʼs roof? On this album Cook is maturing and his travels to capture the spirit of this music appears to be time well spent.
Working with the 2007 Latin Grammy-winning Los Gaiteros de San Jacinto, Cook has combined a traditional style of music known as Vallenato with the rhythms of Rumba Flamenco. “They play this traditional music and make all their own instruments by hand including gaitos flutes. It’s really old school”, says Cook about his collaborators. Cook saw this as an opportunity to find a musical common ground. Itʼs a similar approach he took when recording the many different rhythms in Egypt, Spain and elsewhere for his two more recent studio albums Frontiers and Nomad both of which, it should be noted, quickly climbed to #5 on the Billboard charts.
“I do honestly think this is my best album ever, “ Cook says. “ I donʼt believe that Vallenato and Rumba Flamenco have ever been mixed before. There are some real magic moments.” As a result of his efforts, Acoustic Guitar magazine awarded Jesse the Silver medal in its prestigious Playerʼs Choice Awards.
Come share the energy and passion of this amazing guitarist and his music at the UTC Fine Arts Center!
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ticket information
adults - $22
seniors (age 60 and over) - $19
students - $15 |
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