Wara live at Chrisp Street Festival

After their very successful album launch party at Camden's Jazz Café, Wara will perform at Chrisp Street Festival to coincide with the release of their debut album - Leave To Remain.

This London-based nine-piece band are a hot melting pot of identities, their backgrounds span the world map - Cuba, Argentina, Venezuela, Chile, Ghana, Congo, Spain and the UK.

Formed in 2009, Wara's music effortlessly combines Cuba's most danceable rhythms and styles - timba ('Cuban salsa'), songo, cha-cha-cha, rumba - with contemporary urban elements such as reggae, soul, hip-hop and jazz.

The songs are threaded with bilingual lyrics bursting with social and political commentary.

'We reinterpret what has already been done [in Cuban music] so it applies to young people living here in the UK in 2013,' says Latin powerhouse Eliane Correa, MD and keyboard player.

The rest of the line-up includes Congolese-Argentinean lead vocalist Juanita Euka (niece of legendary Congolese musician Franco), London's Josh Solnick aka Murmur (FUR) as multiple-personality lyricist. Add to this Nana Aldrin Quaye on backing vocals, George Cole on bass, Tauarean Antoine-Chagar on saxophone, Ernesto Marichales tight on percussion, Leandro 'Lele' Mancini on drums and Greg Sanders-Gallego on guitar, whose West African inspired riffs add another geographical twist to the Wara sound.

'Socially conscious, upbeat and joyous' (Songlines, 2013)
'They mash Cuban jazz-funk, clubby beats and smart hooks - lead track Flesh And Bone is a Latin-London blast' (Metro)
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