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MIKATA Benefit Concert for WPKN 89.5-FM Saturday, November 22, 2014
Milford Arts Center
Milford , CT
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Event

MIKATA Benefit Concert for WPKN 89.5-FM Saturday, November 22, 2014
MIKATA Benefit Concert for WPKN 89.5-FM  
Saturday, November 22, 2014

See, Hear and Dance to the LIVE music of one of the area's top international Latin salsa bands.

Starting out as a "worldbeat" band with a 6-year residency at the famed S.O.B.'s in SOHO, New York City MIKATA is now a full-fledged 10-piece SALSA BAND with a recent award-winning CD-release "Ayer y Hoy."

Since the 1990s, Mikata has embraced the hard-edged, big band style of Latin music known as salsa dura -- a sound forged by the likes of Tito Puente, Eddie Palmieri and Celia Cruz).

Where:  Milford Arts Council
       40 Railroad Ave. South
       Milford, CT 06460
       "located right at the old train station downtown"

Doors open at 7pm with music by WPKN Latin DJ's
LIVE performance by MIKATA to start at 8pm

Proceeds benefit noncommercial WPKN 89.5-FM serving Farifield, New Haven, Litchfield (CT), and Suffolk (NY) counties since 1963.  The real alternative, community station.

WPKN thanks it's small-business sponsors of the MIKATA benefit concert:  G-Zen Restaurant (Branford), COLORBLENDS.com, Vincent Jewelers (Milford), Fountainhead Wines (Norwalk, CT & Bedford Hills, NY), UniCare Home Health Care (Stratford), Johnny's Records (Darien).





















Press about MIKATA:  New Haven Register


When Mikata scored their six-year residency at S.O.B.'s, SoHo's iconic live music venue, in 1984, it was through a two-song demo weaving West African rhythms and Western pop/rock.

It was a creative leap for the band, a pure percussion ensemble that had just started adding guitar, bass and horns to its palette of timbales, bongos and congas.

But after the owners of S.O.B.'s heard (and loved) the demo, Mikata was urged to compose enough songs of their new sound -- what would eventually be dubbed worldbeat -- to fill an entire setlist.

"We developed a whole repertoire, feverishly composing music for that first gig as a pop version of Mikata," Richard Hill, the longtime director of the band, recalled. "We became part of this whole worldbeat culture that was starting in the country."

But even as Mikata became more and more entrenched in that culture (popularized by the likes of Paul Simon and The Talking Heads), the desire to explore a different, more genuine expression of African and Caribbean music was bubbling just beneath the surface.

"It was waiting for the chance to take over," Hill said of the salsa and Latin jazz that would come to define the band's sound.

It took several years of artistic soul searching, but by the mid 1990s, those styles had fully materialized in Mikata's music.

The New Haven outfit is marking the apex of that evolution with the release of their first studio album in 10 years, "Ayer y Hoy." The band celebrates the release of the LP with a performance at Bridgeport's Acoustic Cafe on Friday, Sept. 27.

"Ayer y Hoy" finds Mikata genuflecting on both the past and the present, with fresh treatments of classic salsa tunes from the 1950s, '60s and '70s; new arrangements of Latin jazz standards; and original compositions, including one by the group's pianist, David Yih of Hartford, and sung by vocalist Yadi LaViera of New Haven.

"On the one hand, we go back to the early days of salsa, which is rooted in West African percussion and took shape in Cuba," Hill, of New Haven, said of the meaning behind the title of the LP. "Then, we have selections that go up through the '60s and '70s, and up to more contemporary arrangements of Latin jazz tunes."

Since the 1990s, Mikata has embraced the hard-edged, big band style of Latin music known as salsa dura -- a sound forged by the likes of Tito Puente, Eddie Palmieri and Celia Cruz).

"We believe that this is the music that carries the aesthetic in its purist form," Hill said.

As the popularity of Latin music has exploded in recent years, Mikata has found themselves in increasingly high demand. The band has long been a fixture of the New Haven cultural scene, playing at the International Festival of Arts and Ideas and New Haven's 350th birthday celebration, among other events. For the past six years, they have performed regularly at the Wolf Den at Mohegan Sun.

Mikata's all Connecticut line-up is rounded out by vocalist Eddie Rivera of Bridgeport, bassist Jeff McQuillan of Middletown, saxaphonist Will Bartlett of Hamden, bongo player Jenaro Garcia of Meriden; and timbale player Asher Delerme, trumpeter Olivia Malin and alto sax player/guitarist Kenny Blackwell, all of New Haven.

Following national tours throughout the '80s and the release of the 1992 album, "Break The Chain," Mikata suffered a setback when they lost their two lead vocalists (one passed away; the other left pursue a career in musical theater). That effectively squashed their goal of becoming a nationally-known worldbeat act. But that didn't derail the band; rather Hill and crew took it as an opportunity to satisfy an unrequited desire: to explore the salsa and Latin jazz styles that had been waiting to take over.

"Even when we were a worldbeat act, we were attracted to those styles and loved to play them," Hill said. "That's why `Ayer y Hoy' is such a milestone for us."

Location

Milford Arts Center (View)
40 Railroad Ave. South
Milford , CT 06460
United States

Categories

None

Kid Friendly: Yes!
Dog Friendly: No
Wheelchair Accessible: Yes!

Contact

Attendees

Kevin D.
New Haven, CT United States
Nov 21, 2014 12:21 PM
Kevin D.
New Haven, CT United States
Nov 21, 2014 12:21 PM
Kevin D.
New Haven, CT United States
Nov 21, 2014 12:21 PM
Linda F.
Cheshire, CT United States
Nov 21, 2014 10:07 AM
Richard D.
east haven, CT United States
Nov 21, 2014 4:13 AM

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