The Rhythmagic Orchestra

The Rhythmagic Orchestra was founded by Nostalgia 77's Benedic Lamdin and Sofrito's Hugo Mendez as a collaborative project that involved the hottest young players on the U.K.'s jazz scene and Cuban percussionists. It draws its members from the Nostalgia 77 Octet, the Plumstead Radical Club, the Heliocentrics, the Alex Wilson Band, Jazz Jamaica, and Ska Cubano. The unit combines traditional arrangements — using Cuban bata drums — with a new approach to Latin jazz via the early 21st century sound of London's jazz, world, and dance music scenes. Their self-titled debut album was released on the Impossible Ark imprint, and pays tribute to the pioneers of the Afro-Cuban jazz fusion that took place in the late 1940s in the collaborations of bebop maestros Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, and Cuban big-band leaders Chano Pozo and Machito, with fresh innovations and new routes to non-Western music.