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http://cdn1.ustream.tv/swf/4/viewer.46.swf?vid=800138 - The Van Dyke - 10.19.2008
They rocked!! I was enraptured. This project is one of the best ones at the Van Dyke. Very cool but funky.....Weather Report-ish. The coolness of the vibes is balanced by the rock and organic nature of the guitar. I never got tired of the vibes....it is such a fresh sound, so lush. this band blew the house away......on their first gig!
Randy Singer, Van Dyke Music Director - Van Dyke Newsletter - 6/15/08
New World Beat is simply Miami's hottest new jazz fusion ensemble. To be honest, we haven't heard anything like this since we don't remember when. Featuring electric vibraphonist and composer Richard Andrew Sprince, the band performs an all-original repertoire mixing elements of jazz, world, lounge and ambient music to create an exciting new sound.
This new band gave their inaugural performance in a June 15th, 2008 appearance at the Van Dyke, South Florida's leading jazz venue. The Van Dyke is located on the "hip side" of South Beach, Lincoln Road. Since the beginning of the year, the club is under new management and has undergone a rebirth as "the" place to listen to live jazz of all kinds in South Florida.
A packed house expressed enthusiastic approval for the band's original, dynamic and accessible jazz world fusion. Band leader Richard Sprince wowed the crowd with lyrical melodies and solos on his electric vibraphone. The vibes is by nature a visual instrument, and not one often heard. Still, his artful solo lines, four mallet technique and spacey effects - together with the visuals - entranced the usually talkative Van Dyke crowd.
If there was anywhere else to go, guitarist Alvaro Bermudez really took it to the next level. His high energy, virtuoso improvisations at times whipped the music - and the crowd - into a frenzy. Bermudez' playing struck a nice balance with the vibraphone, and along with drummer Victor Bastidas and bassist Agustin Conti, really laid down some exciting and innovative grooves.
Randy Singer, music director for the Van Dyke couldn't get enough of this band. "They rocked! This project is one of the best at the Van Dyke. These guys have a home here". According to Singer, the band will be back at the Van Dyke in August, so keep your eyes open, for this and - we hear - upcoming concert appearances in the Miami area. - RadioElectric.com
... an innovative and intriguing style ... played for an enthusiastic audience ...
Full story:
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2008-08-14/music/new-world-beat/
By Ernest Barteldes
Popularized by Lionel Hampton, the vibraphone is from the same family as the marimba and xylophone. Over the past couple of decades, the instrument has found its place among both the Latin and jazz music scenes thanks to the likes of Tito Puente, Gary Burton (who introduced the four-mallet technique), and New Orleans percussionist Jason Marsalis, the youngest of that famous clan.
It's also the vehicle for electric vibist Richard Andrew Sprince, leader of New World Beat, a local group that mixes elements of Brazilian, African, Latin contemporary jazz, and electronica. Emerging is an innovative and intriguing style that Sprince describes as "a vibraphone version of Pat Metheny's sound."
Formed by Sprince, Alvaro Bermudez (electric and acoustic guitars), Agustin Conti (electric bass), and Victor Bastidas (drums and percussion), New World Beat is very new on the scene. In fact the band debuted just this past June, when it played for an enthusiastic audience at South Beach's Van Dyke, which has been hosting regular jazz concerts since a recent change of management.
New World Beat: Sunday, August 17. Upstairs at the Van Dyke Café. 846 Lincoln Rd., Miami Beach. Doors open at 7 p.m. Admission is free. 305-534-3600, www.thevandykecafe.com
- New Times - 8/14/2008
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NEW!!! - STREAMING VIDEO
Live at the Van Dyke, Miami Beach, 10.19.2008
http://cdn1.ustream.tv/swf/4/viewer.46.swf?vid=800138
New World Beat mixes sounds and rhythms from Africa to the Americas to create new music for the new multi-cultural world in which we now live.
More than a group, New World Beat is a state of mind: a musical journey of world cultures, respecting and promoting awareness of their influences. This fresh new sound will entertain and move you, heart, mind, and soul.
New World Beat is the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist, producer and composer Richard Andrew Sprince (aka "Ricky Ricardo"). Richard has dedicated his entire career to the exploration of Latin American and World music. An accomplished improviser in the jazz idiom, his main instrument is the vibraphone ("vibes"), on which he has developed a unique and modern sound.
Foregoing the vibrato and two mallet stylings of earlier generations of players, Richard uses the four mallet technique, following in the footsteps of his main influence, vibraphone master Gary Burton.
Perhaps more important to both his sound and compositional style is his other great influence, guitarist (and Burton protege) Pat Metheny. For the most part, Richard gets away from the straight ahead acoustic sound of the vibes, instead using an electro-acoustic vibraphone, run through signal effects processing, to achieve his unique sound.
Compositionally, Andrew has paralleled Metheny in writing extended arrangements that explore a variety of modalities, time signatures and rhythmic feels. Like Metheny, Richard studied jazz composition at the University of Miami with jazz composer and educator Ron Miller. Later associations with Brazilian guitarist Toninho Horta and bassist Nico Assumpcao, (both of whom played with Brazilian legend Milton Nascimento), were also influential.
Richard has performed extensively in Europe, North Africa and Brazil, as well as North America. As a keyboardist, vibraphonist and percussionist, he has performed Jazz, Brazilian, Salsa and African music in clubs, music festivals, television and radio. He has worked with internationally recognized musicians, including fusion guitarist Ray Gomez, Paco de Lucia band members: Jorge Pardo, Carlos Benevent, and Ruben Dantas, Jazz Flamenco innovator Jose Antonio Galicia, Spanish jazz singer Pedro Ruy Blas, New York jazz drummer Tony Moreno and many others.
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