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FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Double Grammy Nominee to Turn Up
the Heat at Long’s Park with His Latin Jazz/Fusion July 25,
2010.
LANCASTER, PA -- Double Grammy-nominee Sammy Figueroa &
His Latin Jazz Explosion will detonate the Long’s Park
amphitheater stage July 25, 2010. With their last two releases capturing
Grammy nominations as best Latin jazz albums, they have fast become
“one of the jazz world’s most exciting bands (All About
Jazz). Their sizzling free performance in the 2010 Long’s
Park Summer Music Series will begin Sunday night at 7:30 pm.
Cosponsoring legendary conguero-percussionist and his band is Lancaster
General Health. Radio sponsor will be WLCH Radio Centro.
“After a career that’s spanned more than three decades
and has included countless hundreds of recording sessions and concerts
with the cream of the jazz and pop-music worlds, the Nuyorican percussionist
has finally made his recording debut as a leader,” reported
Jazz Times. “Finally” indeed, celebrated Amazon.com,
“somebody is playing Latin Jazz with fun and fire.”
Sammy Figueroa & His Latin Jazz Explosion has
been personally honored as Best Jazz/Fusion Percussionist by Drum!
Magazine. Wrote Drummers World Magazine, “Sammy is the
Cat. He has long been regarded as one of the premier musicians in
the world.” “To say the man has chops is an understatement,”
declared Latin Beat Magazine.
Sammy Figueroa will come to Lancaster having performed
with other luminaries of jazz, R&B, pop and even New Age. Acclaimed
for “energy and verve, bristling with chops-busting unison
lines and fiery solo exchanges,” JazzTimes credited
Sammy Figueroa for “[adding] fire ... with his
precise, rapid-fire conga playing.”
The son of the well-known ballad singer Charlie Figueroa has come
a long way from his Bronx roots. At the age of 18 Sammy Figueroa
began playing with bassist Bobby Valentin. The innovative
fusion Brazilian/Latin group he soon cofounded broke ground for
many contemporary bands. After releasing a classic album, the band
moved to New York where he was discovered by jazz flautist Herbie
Mann.
In the years since, Figueroa has evolved into “one of music’s
most popular and well-respected sidemen,” proclaimed industry
authority, All About Jazz, noting that he has “played
with everyone from Miles Davis to Mariah Carey to Blues Traveller.”
The list also includes Average White Band and John McLaughlin’s
Mahavishnu Orchestra.
Since then, Figueroa has performed with a host of distinguished
jazz and Latin jazz artists including Quincy Jones, George Benson,
Lena Horne and Ruben Blades. His relationship with Michel
Camilo led to the Grammy-winning pianist and composer writing
in his honor, And Sammy Walked In. This became the title
song for one of his band’s Grammy-nominated albums.
Long’s Park concertgoers may also know Sammy Figueroa
from performances with some of the world’s top pop stars. He
appeared on Mariah Carey’s MTV Unplugged album and video.
He also recorded or performed with James Taylor, Dr. John, Mick
Jagger, David Bowie, Celine Dion, Hall & Oates, Joe Cocker and
many others.
Figueroa is also no stranger to R&B. He was a part of such R&B
hits as Luther Vandross’ The Night I Fell in Love, Chic’s
We Are Family and Ashford and Simpson’s Solid Like a
Rock. Plus, he has recorded with Whitney Houston, Grace Jones,
James Ingram, Diana Ross, Roberta Flack and Aretha Franklin.
Refusing to be roped in by any genre or audience, Sammy Figueroa
has also recorded and appeared with New Age artists such as Paul
Winter, Glen Velez and Michael Schrieve. He worked with
Wynton Marsalis on an educational program for children as
well.
In 2001, Sammy Figueroa relocated to Miami and joined
the band of singer-songwriter Raul Midon. This move to south
Florida opened to him a rich treasure trove of Latin jazz virtuosos
from Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia and Argentina. There he found
his voice as a solo artist when, in 2002, he debuted his award-winning
band, Sammy Figueroa & His Latin Jazz Explosion.
Their first album, And Sammy Walked in, included music by
Michel Camilo, Harmeto Pascual, Eugene Uman and Jimmy
Buffett trumpeter John Lovell. Their second album, The
Magician, featured spectacular original compositions by Venezuelans
Silvano Monasterios and Gabriel Vivas as well as jazz classics like
Seven Steps and Cedar Walton’s Firm Roots. The
group has also appeared at countless festivals and clubs, including
the San Juan Heineken Jazz Festival, the JVC Jazz Festival Miami,
New York’s Jazz Standard and Cleveland’s Nighttown.
The 48th annual Long’s Park Summer Music Series is produced
and underwritten by the Long’s Park Amphitheater Foundation.
The 13 weeks of award-winning, live performances are presented free
of charge at Long’s Park, thanks to generous sponsors, private
donors and proceeds of the Labor Day weekend Long’s Park Art
& Craft Festival. Season sponsors are Pennsylvania College of
Art & Design and Susquehanna Bank. Season media sponsors are
WARM 103 and 96.1 WSOX. Weather sponsor is WGAL-TV News 8. Building
sponsor is Wickersham Construction and Engineering, Inc.
Partial funding has been provided through a grant from the Pennsylvania
Council on the Arts (PCA), a state agency funded by an annual state
appropriation and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal
agency. PCA supplies funding to nonprofit, tax-exempt corporations,
a unit of government or a school district with arts programming
or services in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Long’s Park concertgoers are invited to bring picnics, blankets
and lawn chairs to the park. A selection of food purveyors will
also be in the park, offering a complete meal’s worth of family
foods and desserts. Long’s Park is an alcohol-free park.
Long’s Park is conveniently located at 1441 Harrisburg Pike
in Lancaster, just off Route 30 across from Park City Center. All
events are free of charge and held rain or shine, except in the
case of dangerously inclement weather.
Additional information and links to musical previews of Long’s
Park’s performers can be found at www.longspark.org
or on Facebook. For details on corporate sponsorships of the Long’s
Park Summer Music Series and to learn how to make individual and
corporate contributions, contact the Long’s Park Amphitheater
Foundation at www.longspark.org.
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