Eddie Palmieri Experience

An all-star concert honoring the lifelong devotion of pianist Eddie Palmieri to Afro-Caribbean music and jazz. Fittingly known as The Sun of Latin Music, he was a Puerto Rican visionary whose journey through the Afro-diaspora reshaped the sound of Latin jazz and salsa. Longtime saxophonist with Mr. Palmieri, Louis Fouché, will music direct an star-studded lineup of Palmieri alumni including Brian Lynch, Conrad Herwig, Luques Curtis, Vicente “Little Johnny” Rivero, and others.

Alain Pérez is a talented musician and composer who has worked with major figures in music, such as Irakere, Van Van, Isaac Delgado, Celia Cruz, Paco de Lucía, and Diego “El Cigala.” His musical training began at home with his father, composer Gradelio Pérez, and continued at the Manuel Saumell Conservatory of Music and the National School of Art in Cuba. In 1996, he joined Isaac Delgado’s band and later moved to Spain, where he settled after participating in the project “África-Cuba-Cai” with Enrique Morente. His collaboration with Paco de Lucía in the “Cositas Buenas” project brought him international recognition. In 2002, he won the First SGAE Latin Jazz Prize, and in 2006, he released his musical project with the album En el Aire.

David Sánchez, the GRAMMY Award-winning saxophonist, composer, and educator from Puerto Rico, is recognized worldwide as one of the finest saxophonists and bandleaders of his generation. His mastery of the instrument is undeniable, and his sound is unmistakable. His music draws deeply from Afro-Caribbean and Pan-African traditions, blending them seamlessly with jazz. His acclaimed and multi-nominated recordings include Obsesión, Melaza, Coral, and Carib. Sánchez has performed and recorded with legends such as Dizzy Gillespie, Eddie Palmieri, Kenny Barron, Charlie Haden, Roy Hargrove, Roy Haynes, Pat Metheny, and Elvin Jones. He’s a member of the prestigious SFJAZZ Collective, representing the SFJAZZ organization. He is also a dedicated educator, an active faculty member in the RJAM program at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Bassist and composer Carlos Henriquez was born in 1979 in the Bronx, New York. He took up the bass while enrolled in The Juilliard School’s Music Advancement Program. At LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, Henriquez participated in the LaGuardia Concert Jazz Ensemble which went on to win first place in Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Essentially Ellington competition. In 1998, Henriquez joined the Wynton Marsalis Septet and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, touring the world and playing on more than 25 albums. He has performed with diverse artists including Chucho Valdés, Paco De Lucía, Tito Puente, the Marsalis Family, Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Lenny Kravitz, and Marc Anthony. He has been a member of the music faculty at Northwestern University School of Music since 2008 and, in 2010, served as musical director of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra’s cultural exchange with the Cuban Institute of Music with Chucho Valdés. He issued his debut album as a leader, The Bronx Pyramid, in 2015 on Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Blue Engine Records; his Grammy-nominated release The South Bronx Story in 2022; and his latest album A Nuyorican Tale, was released in 2023.

Saxophonist and composer Melissa Aldana was born in Santiago, Chile and grew up in a musical family. Both her father and grandfather were saxophonists and she took up the instrument at age six under her father Marcos’ tutelage. Aldana began on alto, influenced by artists such as Charlie Parker and Cannonball Adderley, but switched to tenor upon first hearing the music of Sonny Rollins. She performed in Santiago jazz clubs in her early teens and was invited by pianist Danilo Pérez to play at the Panama Jazz Festival in 2005. Aldana moved to the U.S. to attend the Berklee College of Music, and the year after graduating she released her first album Free Fall on Greg Osby’s Inner Circle label in 2010, followed by Second Cycle in 2012. In 2013, at age 24, she became the first female instrumentalist and the first South American musician to win the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition, in which her father had been a semi-finalist in 1991. After her win, she released her third album Melissa Aldana & Crash Trio (Concord). Aldana’s celebrated 2019 album Visions (Motéma) earned the saxophonist her first-ever GRAMMY nomination for Best Improvised Jazz Solo. Aldana was one of the founding members of ARTEMIS, the all-star collective that released their debut album ARTEMIS on Blue Note in 2020. Aldana began releasing her own leader albums on Blue Note in 2022 with 12 Stars followed by 2024’s Echoes Of The Inner Prophet, both of which featured her original compositions performed by her longtime working quintet. 2026’s Filin is a ballads album of songs drawn from Cuba’s Filin music tradition featuring Aldana leading a quartet with Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Peter Washington, and Kush Abadey.