DIÁSPORA gets audiences moving to the music at Matt & Phred's Jazz Club

It was an epic night on Sunday May Day Bank Holiday as the DIÁSPORA 11-piece band performed an explosive three sets at Matt & Phred’s Jazz Club. If you’re not familiar with the club, it’s a very bohemian and cosmopolitan bar in the Northern Quarter of Manchester, and the guys sure know how to whizz up a tasty cocktail! The lights were dimmed, and the candles were on the tables, with salsa music playing in the background – which set the mood perfectly for the night’s proceedings. ​

The night began with some free improvisatory piano meanderings that broke out into a soulful Timba vamp, which set the stage for DIÁSPORA to premiere their new original ‘Time is Running Out’ – a composition juxtaposing a relentless mambo (‘Feel the rhythm beating in your brain / Feel the pressure pumping in your vein’) with a swinging samba ‘Partido Alto’ brass riff. This followed with a brief sojourn into Hollywood with the next two tunes ‘Cuba’ and ‘Do You Only Wanna Dance’ (from ‘Dirty Dancing 2: Havana Nights’).

The set culminated with two tunes in the Guaguancó style – one of Cuba’s most poignant folkloric rhythms; ‘Caravan’ featured some battering percussion solos from Venezuelan conguero Frank Mata and the band’s very own bonguera and timekeeper Rosemary “Rosita” Toll. The virtuosic piano skills of Andy Stamatakis-Brown really came to the forefront in this arrangement with a rippling improvisation that steadily built up and raised the roof off the club – ending in a dramatic triplet break with the whole band in unison, which ripped away the cover to reveal underneath the more introverted poem and DIÁSPORA original – ‘Místico’.

The set culminated with two tunes in the Guaguancó style – one of Cuba’s most poignant folkloric rhythms; ‘Caravan’ featured some battering percussion solos from Venezuelan conguero Frank Mata and the band’s very own bonguera and timekeeper Rosemary “Rosita” Toll. The virtuosic piano skills of Andy Stamatakis-Brown really came to the forefront in this arrangement with a rippling improvisation that steadily built up and raised the roof off the club – ending in a dramatic triplet break with the whole band in unison, which ripped away the cover to reveal underneath the more introverted poem and DIÁSPORA original – ‘Místico’.

Set 3 exploded with DIÁSPORA’s male vocalist and front man James Vielma calling out to the people of the world – from Venezuela, Peru, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Cuba, to England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Manchester – to ‘Get Up Stand Up’ – with an ‘Ojos de Brujos’ style arrangement of the Bob Marley classic, combining flamenco, rap and reggae. This left the audience clapping in time, which cued in perfectly the Ricky Martin carnival fiesta hit tune ‘La Bomba’. The Baroque-salsa composition ‘Move to the Music’ really showed off the mesmerizing vocal style and phrasing of DIÁSPORA’s female vocalist and leading lady Alyss Rose, leading to getting the audience singing along to it’s catchy refrain (‘If you move to the music, then you’ll live to a hundred’).

The culminating salsa arrangements ‘Moondance’ and the hit Puerto Rican song ‘Déjame Soñar’ brought the night to an upbeat climax – instantly filling the dance floor and featuring an explosive percussion solo from DIÁSPORA’s maverick drummer Dave Simpson.

Altogether, the energy and momentum gradually increased throughout the gig, leaving the audience in rapture after each set. With the last tune finished, and the epic ten minute introduction through all ELEVEN band members, the packed club were screaming for more (‘two more songs!’). And so the chairs were cleared away and the audience was serenaded with DIÁSPORA’s well-known reggae version of the classic ‘Lágrimas Negras’ to bring the night to a jubilant finale.

DIÁSPORA provides the perfect catalyst for an engaging live outfit – delicately poised between the technical sophistication of ‘jazz’ and harmonic improvisation carried out by the band and its individual soloists; and its entertaining engagement with the audience. The arrangements themselves are pretty simple: containing flexible, open platforms that allow the band to stretch out and to really explore their musical territory, punctuated with unifying sections that bring the band into triumphant moments of tightness and togetherness.

​DIÁSPORA has become a real ‘VIBE’ band: it’s a single living, breathing, moving organism, yet it’s free and open at the same time, resulting in bursts of collective spontaneity – clapping in clave, improvised ‘coro’ refrains and onstage dancing left and right. The eleven-piece lineup blends influences from Latin American, mainstream popular and world rhythms, and can be described as truly a musical carnival. By the end of the night, the club was full of people dancing, drinking and having a great time, and most of the audience carried on dancing into the early hours of the morning – long after the DJ had started playing. A great night for DIÁSPORA, and a promising taste of what’s to come.
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“...a hugely talented and energetic band...This is a band we will definitely be booking again and again.”
Matt & Phred’s Jazz Club

“...a young band set to ignite and inspire listeners and dancers wherever they appear.” Manchester Jazz Festival

“Absolutely stunning.” Band on the Wall