hot latin jazz heats up art museum

The Knoxville Museum of Art’s Alive After Five concert series presents Rolando Matias & the Afro-Rican Ensemble on Friday, July 31, 2009, from 5:30-8:00 pm.
Thanks to their blistering performances at festivals, music halls and jazz series, Rolando Matias & the Afro-Rican Ensemble has established itself as one of the hottest and most requested Latin ensembles in the country.

The group tastefully blends African rhythms and Latin soul with straight ahead jazz to create an eclectic sound that brings a whole new meaning to the term “jazz”.  The Ensemble has performed at many festivals in the U. S. and the Caribbean, including the Pittsburgh Mellon Jazz Festival, the Virginia Beach Arts & Jazz Festival, Chattanooga’s Riverbend Festival, the Jamaica Ocho Rios Jazz Festival, the Dominican Republic Jazz Festival and the St. Lucia Jazz Festival. Band leader and percussionist Rolando Matias, a native of Puerto Rico now residing in Columbus, Ohio, has performed with many notable artists in multiple musical genres such as Othello Molineaux, David Sanchez, Eddy “The Chief” Clearwater, Duke Robillard, , and many more.
For more information about Rolando Matias & Afro-Rican Ensemble, visit http://www.afroricanensemble.net.  
Admission to the July 10 performance of Alive After Five is $9 for non-members, and $5 for museum members and students with ID. Children age 17 and under are admitted free. The summer series of Alive After Five is sponsored by Cherokee Distributing Company, Knoxville News Sentinel, WDVX-FM, and WVLT-TV8. For more information about the Alive After Five series, call (865) 525-6101 or visit www.knoxart.org.