Joana Almeida vocals and guitar (Portugal)
Joana is one of the very first women working as a fado guitarist, in Portugal. She started to study at the age of 11, with Gracindo Costa and slowly, she was accepted in the professional fado scene in Porto. At the age of 22 and in the next four years, she attended the jazz department in Valentim de Carvalho Academy. Studied with masters in the fado scene like Bruno Brás, Eurico Costa e Nuno Campos. Beyond Lisbon Fado, Joana is exploring different music genres like popular and traditional Portuguese music, bossa nova and jazz music.
Thus, she integrated various projects as: “Canções de Zeca Afonso”, “Fado dos Dentes”, “Coimbra à Moda do Porto”, “Tulipa” and “Bossa em Trio”.
During her journey, she had the opportunity to play with various Portuguese guitar musicians as Eduardo Jorge, Samuel Cabral, Mário Henriques, Márcio Silva and Domingos Mateus, and with different fado singers like António Laranjeira, Mariana Correia, Francisco Moreira, Miguel Bandeirinha, among others.
Almeida played besides Portugal in different countries such as Spain, Luxembourg, Netherlands and Uzbekistan, in “Sharq Taronalari Folk Music Festival” (Samarkand, 2019). In 2019, after to become a present musician in fado scene of Porto, she was invited to join the cast of the older fado house in Porto, the Casa da Mariquinhas. In September of 2020, exploring arrangements and composition, Joana founded the first female fado ensemble, the Amara Quartet. Also, by invitation and in partnership with Sjahin During, Joana started the first group with her own compositions, Cacha Mundinho.
Sjahin During percussion (Turkey/Netherlands)
Sjahin is a permanent resident of the Netherlands where he makes a living as a musician, having founded several groups that include Bayuba Cante, Turqumstances, Tarhana, Afro Anatolian Tales and most recently Arifa & Voices from the East and the Namibian Tales. He is a producer and teacher of world music, specialized in percussion. During has studied and performed on five continents, learning from masters as far afield as Havana, Cuba to Istanbul, Turkey as well as India, Spain and Africa.
He collaborated with amazing artists as Claron Mcfadden , Asko – Schönberg Ensemble, Harmen Franje, Arto Tunçboyaciyan, Eric Vloeimans, Miguel “Anga” Diaz, Simon Phillips, Pedro Luis Ferrer, Lakha Khan Jorge Reyes, Naseer Shamma, Edmare Castaneda, Alex Simu, Aynur,
Osama Abdulrasol, Mola Sylla, Franz von Chossy, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui (Les Ballets C. de la B.), the Gypsy’s from Rajasthan & Theodosii Spassov.
Sjahin performed in 32 countries worldwide at international festivals and venues such as the Concertgebouw, London Jazz Festival Southbank Centre, Kennedy Art Centre USA, Ethnoport Festival, Jarasum International Jazz Festival, Jazzahead, Chicago World Music Festival, Amsterdam Roots, Bimhuis, Garana Jazz, Havana Jazz, Istanbul Akbank Festival, Shanghai World Music Festival, de Roma, Barbican’s Transcender Festival, Glatt & Verkehrt Festival, BBC Broadcasting House London.
Maripepa Contreras oboé & duduk (Spain)
There are not so many jazz oboists but Maripepa Contreras is one of the best.
Born in Spain (Almuñécar, 1989), Maripepa started at the age of 5 with music. Thanks to her mother, who would take her by car to the conservatory since she was 11 years old, she got a higher degree in oboe performance at Conservatorio Superior de Música de Málaga (Spain), with teacher René Martín Rodríguez in 2011.
She entered in the world of jazz in 2013, taking lessons with Ernesto Aurignac who brought her talent into a new direction.
In 2018, she won the scholarship AIE Jazz Tete Montoliu to finish the bachelor of oboe jazz in the Conservatorium van Amsterdam with teachers: Jasper Blom, Simon Richter, Ben van Gelder and Ernest Rombout. Nowadays she is dedicating herself entirely to music as a performer, composer, arranger and she is teaching "oboe jazz" online and onsite.
She has played in “XXVIII Festival internacional de jazz de Málaga”, “34 Festival Jazz Terrassa”, “Festival de jazz de Sant Andreu (2015)”, Grachtenfestival in Amsterdam (2017), 50 Voll-Damm Festival Internacional de Jazz de Barcelona (2018), Jazzahara (2019), etc.
Pedro Ivo Ferreira double bass (Brazil)
Born in Juiz de Fora (Brazil), Pedro Ivo Ferreira started learning bass at the age of 15 in the local scene in his hometown. At the age of 21, he moved to São Paulo to study double bass with Sizão Machado, the legendary bassist of Brazilian music. In 2012 he moved to France to continue his studies at the Paris CRR. After obtaining his degree in music (DEM) in 2014, he moved to Amsterdam to obtain his Bachelor's degree.
He studies with big names of European and international double bass players such as: John Clayton, Enrst Glerum and Frans van der Hoeven.
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In the Netherlands he plays with various jazz and improvised music projects such as Orè, Canvas, Noneto Desconcertante, OWL Man, Adrian Moncada Sextet, Maripepa Contreras, Jonathan Dafgard, Sama / Ferreira / Jaspers, Gabriel Milliet.
With Canvas Trio he recorded two albums as double bass player and composer: Common Ground (2015) and Transitions (2017). In 2019, he recorded an EP by the group he founded, Noneto Desconcertante, featuring his arrangements and compositions. In 2021 he recorded an EP with his quartet "Orè" with Brazilian and freely improvised music. With Nefertiti Quartet he recorded four albums "Danses Futuristes" (2015), "Morse Code" (2018), "Frameless" (2022) and "Live In Paris" (2023); and plays a lot in Europe.
In 2019, the group Nefertiti was selected to participate in the Jazz Migration #5 program and in June 2019 won the Euro Radio Competition in Copenhagen.