Saturday, July 16th · 8:00pm – 11:30pm
Victoria Hotel, Menai Bridge (The Vic) LL59 5DR
Celebrate the summer with some funky afro latin dance grooves. Learn some new dance steps with Helen McGreary who will be leading us through some moves. Banda Bacana are playing 2 sets with DJ Onda Latina supporting with tunage from Reggaeton, Latin hip-hop and Salsa Moderna.
8 Till Late, £7 on the door
We are happy to that we are now running the latest version of WordPress. And as usual the lovely folk in the WordPress community kept us on the right track. As well as running new software on our website Banda Bacana is enjoying the summer!
We’ve been invited to play at some lovely events. Botanical Beats in Treborth Botanical Gardens was great! As usual the event was a colourful mix of music, food, art and crafts with a lovely friendly vibe, raising money and awareness about the Gardens and the work that goes on there. The photo above is taken by Edyta of Emagine Pictures. See more of Emagine’s wonderful photos of botanical beats on Facebook Another highlight was our first foray down the Conwy Valley bringing Afro Latin dance grooves to Trefriw Village Hall. Great night, great crowd! We’d love to go back and play there!
Festival season is upon us. And you may find the BBs at a wedding, party or beach near you! Check out our Myspace or connect with us on Facebook for up to date info 🙂
Chasing the winter blues away at Bangor Railway Inst. BandaBacana, the L.G.C. (Latin Groove Collective) and the eclectic Jah Bah DJs. Fueled by yummy south american food from Oren (check-in to Oren on foursquare).
thanks to Teresa for the photy
Award winning welsh film production company Bamboo Chicken presents Banda Bacana in Hendre Hall Tal y Bont.
Many thanks to Cory West who kindly took these photos.
Sunday’s Launch was a blast! Thanks to all our friends, fans and families for coming along, dressing up and getting down. We had a fantastic day, bringing sunshine to a stormy sunday. Here are a few kind words from some of our more voluble supporters:
Just like to say how much everyone I was with enjoyed Sunday. It was a lovely atmosphere and great entertainment.Best wishes, Viv
I have just listened to ‘Bandabacana’: it’s great! I’ve been playing music (albeit in a ceilidh band) for 45 years, and listened to many albums and this is one of the best. It cheered me up driving to work, and that’s a real achievement. Bright, uplifting, unique and brilliantly produced, the world needs to hear it. Congratulations to you all. Barry (Dalton) Mooncoin
Cds arrived safely and what a cracker the Banda Bacana is! Craig
Banda Bacana are proud and happy to announce the release of our first album “Danza Negra”. Come to The Victoria Hotel in Menai Bridge on 22 November from 3pm onwards and celebrate with us! With a prize for the best fancy dress and a flourish of talented musicians and dancers there will be a feast of music and entertainment for your eyes and ears.
Banda Bacana will be playing 2 – 3 sets throughout the day and will be joined by the Jochen Eisentraut Trio hopefully showcasing material from their new album, Latin Groove Collective playing folkloric rhythms from cuba, Haiti, brazil and more, Jah Bar Collective featuring Dj’s Hippy Ad, Senor Tim, Jah Mary, N-Rich and Ralpho. Plus Capoera Pays de Gales, dance instructor Helen Mcgreary doing her funky dance class during the afternoon and Cheap Frills Can Can Girlz will be kicking off the evening.
It starts at 3pm, kids are welcome, tickets £5 adults and under 16s free
Go to facebook to get the latest developments on the event times and running order
We also love bossa nova! See this glorious vid of the fantastic duo Toquino and Vinicius performing back in the day
ok ok so his pronunciation is good….. but we’re way better lookin!
Ghana is a song that was written by musician and composer Dorothy Masuka to celebrate the wave of independence that spread across Africa in the 60s lead by Nkrumah in Ghana.
Kwame Nkrumah was a visionary leader who came to power in Ghana in 1957 after the British left. His belief in Pan African independence as well as the indepence of Ghana meant that he gave hope and inspiration to other nations striving to escape colonial rule. He was put in prison for campaigning and organising for equal rights for all. While he was still in prison in 1951, his party was elected by a landslide, a year later he became Prime Minister and in 1957 he lead Ghana to independence.
During his leadership he set up free education, free health-care, hospitals were built, as was the infrastructure for the industrialisation of Ghana. Get more info on wikipedia and also see interview with Gamal Nkrumah (Nkrumah’s son) talking about his father and Ghanain independence.
Find out more about Dorothy Masuka’s life and music and listen to Ghana on last.fm
The song also features on: 
More Great Moments in Vinyl History
and makes the Guardian “Readers recommend: the A-Z of all songs ever listed”
Banda Bacana play groove and rhythm driven tunes from South America, the Caribbean and Africa. Our influences are diverse but we are all into world music and watching and playing live music especially dance music.
Nigerian born vocalist Loulou leads the vocals with Ceri, who mixes strong samba influences with a musical background of celtic folk, and guitarist Kate, another samba baby, who plays guitar with percussion roots. Drum kit player Owen, AKA Groove Farmer, creates a fertile blend of unstoppable beats: Record shop owner, promoter and wealth of musical knowledge influences from Blues to Rock Steady, High-life to Klesma. Founder member John, the daddy of Bacana, cuts solid bass lines; latin, afro-beat, reggae and ska: Another gold mine of information about all things funky from around the world and beyond …
Most of us have got day jobs but we are lucky enough to have Jochen as a regular player who is a jazz musician and composer. We’ve also had younger members, Chris and Kate, who have come from the North Wales Youth Jazz Band. Chris left us to study classical music in London and Kate went a year later to study Jazz at Leeds. They come and play with us sometimes in the holidays and its really cool to hear them play again. Einion and Ray both local jazz players from North Wales play with us occasionally. The line up is pretty flexible with Jeff joining us from the North Sea when they let him out for good behaviour, and when Neil does the PA he’ll also dust off his trumpet, a real treat!
The band plays groove based music from a variety of cultures. It can take in funky Afrobeat, or Latin American influences, with the emphasis on getting up, dancing & having fun.
Latin music is kind of like jazz in that there are standard tunes. When we are getting a tune together we would pick up the groove from a record and a chorus line and a sax riff and then play around with it. The rhythm sections would be working getting a solid groove going while the horns and vocals would pull a song stucture together. We try and go for what feels natural for us … less risky!
Si se puede is one of the favourite tunes. Its a tune by a New York afro beat band Antibalas. When the different parts lock together rhythmically, the groove is hypnotic but really swings at the same time. Our audience really go for the ska ones like pipeline. People like something familiar they can key into, especially when they’re out for a dance, and ska tunes are a real strong influence on north wales bands.