“The Hollywood Bowl fascinates me: I have played there several times and it sounds very good and on stage the energy is always rich to do new things,” says Cimafunk about what he expects from his next presentation as part of the Hollywood Bowl Jazz Festival, this Saturday June 15.
The Cuban performer, compared to none other than the Godfather of Soul, James Brown, due in part to his stage presence, wants the audience to be nourished by his music and live an almost nutritional experience with the songs from his new album For your Body.
“My sound is a nutrient [que va] beyond generating a certain sensation; It is something that is good for you, that is good for your health, that is healing,” she says in a telephone conversation with this medium from his new home in New Orleans.
And in his tours and presentations in Europe, Japan and around the world since 2015, he understood the importance of that deep symbiotic relationship that can be formed between an artist and his audience and integrated it into his creative process.
“People become one body moving with the flow… in Tokyo, New Zealand, Australia or Brazil the culture is different but the reaction of the people is similar when you give them that groove, people experience the frequency and they kind of disconnect.” of themselves and join the music,” he says.
With catchy songs like Me Voy, the recent Catalina (in collaboration with the Colombians of Monsieur Periné) or the release of Pretty with Big Freedia (where he combines rhythms by Ramón “Mongo” Santamaría, the iconic drummer of pachanga and boogaloo of the 60’s) this ‘wild’ singer from Pinar del Río shows his versatility to intuitively follow a long tradition of rhythm that inhabits a good part of the Caribbean and of course its largest island: Cuba.
“I am the first to dedicate myself to music but my family spends all day singing… My uncles, my grandparents, my great aunts, my cousins have rap groups… I come from a flow where the muse was all the time “, Explain.
Theirs is a simple and profound experience and a sign that for some there are only deviations on a route that seems almost pre-established by destiny. Thus, it was influenced by Cuban popular music in particular and Latin music in general but also the world sounds of R&B, pop and rap.
“I grew up with Bam Bam, Irakere, Benny Moré, Pablo Milanés and Buena Vista Social Club but also with Fito Páez, Alejandro Sanz, Stevie Wonder and Usher,” he points out.
He also tells us about the hard journey through the countryside with houses with dirt floors, first to Havana, looking for money, initially with painting and baking jobs to buy some shoes and later finally with music, when “there came a time when “I started to make a living from that, recording choir for other artists.”
However, in his memory there is not even the slightest hint of complaint.
“I was lucky to live that whole life with very little… my family was always very humble but I never felt that and my mind was always looking for what I want and that was what they taught me at home: focus on what you want to achieve” , he recalls with pride.
Now, in world-class venues such as Montreux and the Hollywood Bowl itself, he projects a sound full of energy with songs that he records step by step with his own voice and passes on to musicians who make his musical ideas come true.
He will share the stage with Jodeci, Andra Day, Christian McBride, Charles Lloyd and Jason Moran, Larry Grenadier and Brian Blade, Mulatu Astatke, Alex Isley and the Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz Performance at UCLA for two days full of Jazz, R&B and the cozy atmosphere summer in the iconic Los Angeles setting.
In detail:
That: Cimafunk Concert- Hollywood Bowl Jazz Festival
When: Saturday June 15- starting at 3:30 pm
Where: Hollywood Bowl -2301 Highland Ave., Los Angeles
Information: https://www.hollywoodbowl.com