La Dame Blanche

With her always expanding and singular mix of hip hop, female empowerment, dancehall, and catchy beats, singer, flautist, and percussionist Yaite Ramos Rodriguez, aka La Dame Blanche, delivers a powerful and compelling sound that summons the spirits.

Born and raised in Pinar del Rio, the westernmost province of Cuba, her mother wanted a girl and after three boys, Yaite was born. “As a child, I didn’t realize how poor we were”, she said, but she knew she was “loved and happy with little like any happy Cuban child”. She was the daughter of Jesús “Aguaje” Ramos, the artistic director of the Buena Vista Social Club orquestra, her days on the island filled with dancing and singing, though it was in Paris that she began sharing her music with artists around the world.

“My dad was the person that I always wanted to impress”, she tells, while confessing that “the entire world knew me as HIS daughter and that is one of the reasons I called this album ELLA (HER).” This fourth album by La Dame Blanche is a tribute to her mother, and all of the women that inhabit La Dame Blanche. “My mom makes everything shine, from the floors of the house to the music in my soul”.

This is the reason that “ELLA” has such a powerful and rebellious spirit, and is above all a tribute to women, with ten songs that represent all sides of the artist.

This Cuban living in Paris creates blends in every aspect; between Latin and Urban, Cumbia and Hip-Hop, the strong and the sensual, and the stage lights a show and the flame of a candle in a ritual.

MIDEM’s Artist Accelerator 2018 — globalFEST 2018 — SXSW 2017 — WOMEX 2017 official selection

During the last 7 years, she performed nearly 500 shows, in 36 countries of 5 continents.

Including Vive Latino (MX) Paleo Festival (CH) Festival International de Jazz de Montréal (CA) Summerstage NYC (USA) Sziget Festival (HU) SXSW Austin (USA) Feria Internacional del Libro Guadalajara (MEX) globalFEST (USA) California Worldfest (USA) Rototom Sunsplash (ES)
Carnaval de Bahidora (MEX) WOMAD (UK) BAM Barcelona (ES) Rudolstadt Festival (DE) Sommerfestival der Kulturen Stuttgart (DE) Festival Couleur Café (BE) Festival MED (PT) Wild Mint Festival (RU) Masala Weltbeat Festival (DE) Festival Rec-Beat (BR) Festival Shambala (UK) Ariano Folk Festival (IT) Antilliaanse Feesten (BE) Gwangju World Music Festival (KR) Ariano Folk Festival (IT) Jazzmandu Festival Kathmandu (NP) Kulturpark Košice (SK) Parkteatern Stockholm (SE) Festival Mundial (NL) Sommarscen Malmö (SE) Fusion Festival (DE) Festival Sound-Ports (TR) Africa Festival (DE) Union Scene (NO) …

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Candeleros

Psychedelic afro-caribbean Cumbia

Drawing from influences like Cumbia, Merengue, Dub and afro-caribbean rhythms, Candeleros surrender to a sort of exorcism full of differents sounds in which they reach altered states of consciousness. All of this includes percussion sounds coming from the beyond, Andean echoes, cinematic atmospheres and tunes that seem to come from an old episode of The Twilight Zone. Candeleros music is like digging into a postmodernism hole to find the very pure of tropicalismo.

Candeleros is a plurinacional group of six people that come from Colombia and Venezuela. They have their operational center in Madrid, from where they try to expand a multicoloured psychedelic sound to dance. “Echar una candela” is commonly known as the improvised reunion around the tobacco, fire and music. “La candela” also is the measurement for the lights units and their intensity. “Candela” and “fuego” are also used as metaphors for passion, hit and love.

Candeleros goal is to unify the afro-caribbean sounds as a proof of identity, folklore and modernity. William, Fernando, Urko, Sergio, Alex and Andrés come from places where we can listen to rhythms like Cumbia and Son. They have mixed these rhythms alongside with percussion sounds and guitars to create a sort of psychedelic ritual.

During their seven years of musical trajectory, Candeleros has performed in differents shows around Europe and United States. They have performed in important festivals such as Sonorama Ribera, Trans Musicales de Rennes (France), Sziget Festival (Budapest), BAM Festival (Barcelona), SXSW (Austin).

In addition to all of this, Candeleros music can be found in music platforms such as KEXP radio, FIP Radio, Radio Gladys Palmera and Sofar Sounds Madrid.

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Nortec Collective

BOSTICH + FUSSIBLE emerged from the burgeoning electronic scene in Tijuana. In 1999 they invented a new style of music called Nortec – a fusion of Norteño (“from the North”) and Techno, founding as well the Nortec Collective.

Documenting the collision between electronic music characterized by heavy dance beats and traditional forms of Mexican music performed with live instrumentation, Nortec Collective paved the way for a new generation of producers and DJs that have reinvented electronic music from a global perspective.

Their last album “Motel Baja” was released in 2014 closing their Nortec trilogy with the Grammy nominees “Bulevar 2000” and “Tijuana Sound Machine”.

The duo has toured for the last 15 years around the globe from Europe to Australia, from South America to Japan and China, also performed in the most important festivals such as Bonnaroo and Coachella – all while still managing to find the time to become iconic artists in their home country of Mexico.

Since 1999, the Nortec Collective musicians have toured throughout the United States, Mexico, Europe, Japan and Latin America. They have played at Central Park’s SummerStage and Irving Plaza in New York, as well as the Winter Music Conference in Miami, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and shows at the Royal Festival Hall in London and Elysée Montmartre in Paris.

They have done remixes for Beck, Calexico, Ennio Morricone, Kronos Quartet, Leigh Nash, Lenny Kravitz among others…

The song “Tijuana Makes Me Happy” was on the soundtrack of 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany, the video game by EA Sports, and is the title song of the feature film by the same name.

In 2016, Nortec collaborated on the production for the music for Cirque Du Soleil’s show, Luzia.

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