The annual GroundUP Music Festival in Miami Beach coming up February 2-4 is the preeminent event in the realm of world-class funk, jazz, fusion and world music. This year’s event is shaping up to be the most spectacular of all. I can say that having attended all prior events going back to 2017, considering the totality of the regular festival programming, the late night sets and the brunches just announced this past week.
Each year, Michael League, Snarky Puppy’s leader, bassist and festival artistic director and Paul Lehr, head of GroundUP Music put together a lineup that has many unfamiliar artists on the list. Each year, I have 100% faith that each and every performer will be stellar — the festival serves as an eye opener for artists that Michael adores and thinks all of the attendees should hear and know about. This year is no different in that respect and on top of that there are some special surprises at the festival, late night and for the brunches. One thing’s for sure – this year’s festival is really a world event with musical styles from Europe, the Carribean, Mexico, Africa and more!
I always check out the artists that I don’t know beforehand, and it only heightens my excitement. Here’s my daily rundown of the festival sets. I’ll be covering the the brunches and late-night sets in my next article!
Friday
Elena Pinderhughes, Artist-At-Large
Friday’s lineup is short but mighty. First off, I’ve got to give recognition to the great addition of Elena Pinderhughes, flutist and singer as Artist-At-Large. I’ve been a fan of jazz flute forever, following a long line from Herbie Mann to Hubert Laws to Bobbi Humphrey to Karl Denson. I even got introduced to another favorite, Carlos Malta, when I attended the Family Dinner, Vol. 2 recording sessions and he participated in several GUMF’s including late night shenanigans! I’m hoping to see her a lot during the weekend and follow in Carlos’ footsteps into the wee hours!
Los Muñequitos & Afrocuba All Stars
I pieced together a little backstory for this group and I’ll shoot for more details at the fest. I know that a few years back Michael did some work on an album for The Buena Vista Social Club, a legendary ensemble out of Cuba and he brought Eliades Ochoa from Buena Vista to GUMF’18. Harold López-Nussa, a Cuban pianist was also at GUMF ’18 for a terrific set on a blazing afternoon.
This year Michael is bringing two group from the city of Matanzas, each of Havana. Los Muñequitos de Matanzas and Afrocuba de Matanzas will each perform their own sets on Saturday and Sunday but on Friday, they’ll be performing an “All Star” set which is going to be a powerful melding of styles. For most people, it will be a once in a lifetime experience.
Snarky Puppy Family Dinner Set (And Experience)
Snarky Puppy listeners know the band plays instrumental music except when they’ve made Family Dinner Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 (and Amkeni). For the FD albums, they invite vocalists and instrumentalist to guest on individual songs in front of live audiences in the recording studio. In this way the albums are more of a compilation and the songs are rarely played live. I had the opportunity to attend FD2 in New Orleans in 2015 and it was life changing with a chance to see, hear and meet Croz, Becca, Michelle, Knower and all the other great guests and SP band members.
Now, GUMF attendees will have the chance to actually have a dinner with the artists (oh yeah) AND see a Family Dinner-style LIVE SET with special guest vocalists that include Knower, Louis Cole, Genevieve Artadi, Chantae Cann, Lucy Woodward and Magda Giannikou. Guaranteed, this is gonna be a all-timer of a set!
Saturday
Los Muñequitos de Matanzas
This group is totally new to me, a rumba dance/percussion and singing group from the Matanzas city and province. A little search says they’ve been around for over 70 years playing the traditional Afro-Cuban dance music.
Louis Cole’s Huge Band
Louis Cole and Genevieve Artadi together as the group Knower recorded on FD2. I’ve also enjoyed subsequent Knower shows a couple of times in Atlanta as well as at GUMF ’18 and then Louis Cole in 2022. The best I could find on YouTube is his “Big Band” and I can only assume that the “Huge Band” will be bigger and possible have some Pup participation? This is gonna be well…you know.
Kinga Głyk feat. Robert “Sput” Searight, Casey Benjamin, Brett Williams & Dominic Xavier Taplin
Kinga Głyk is a funky bass player from Poland. Not sure how she and Michael connected but she mentions that he wrote the song (I think) at the beginning of this video. Further adding Sput (drums) and Dominic (keys) from Ghost-Note and Casey (Robert Glasper) on sax and Brett Williams (keys) and you know it’s gonna be a great time.
Gisela João
Gisela is a contemporary fado singer, which is traditional Portuguese music. She was wonderful at GUMF ’23 on her own and as part of the supergroup Mirrors. She also is accompanied by Justin Stanton in this video and at this year’s fest they’ll perform together late night.
Fuensanta
Fuensanta Mendez is a terrific multi-instrumentalist and vocalist from Mexico. Judging from this video of her voice and double bass, this set is bound to be memorable and maybe a springboard for her young career.
Etienne Charles and Creole Soul
Etienne is a Trinidad-born trumpeter, composer and jazz professor. From Amazon, “Creole Soul is an exploration of Charles musical roots featuring sounds from the French, Spanish and English speaking Caribbean as well as North America. Creole Soul highlights myriad inspirations from Haitian Creole chants and blues to bebop and R&B while drawing on an array of rhythms including Rocksteady, Reggae, Bel Air, Kongo and Calypso.” That sounds pretty spicy to me.
Sunday
Grupo Afrocuba de Matanzas
Grupo Afrocuba will be further exposure to the music, dance and culture of the Matanzas area and will complete the three-set grouping. I’m excited to hear and see more of this vibrant music.
Nate Wood – fOUR
Nate Wood is one of the ‘bands’ that I’ve seen, since he opened on four of the Snarky shows I saw this year. I have ‘bands’ in quotes because Nate is an amazing fOUR in one-man band playing drums, keys, guitar and voice. Seeing is believing and I know the Miami crowd will enjoy this set.
Varijashree Venugopal
Varijashree is a singer and flutist from India if I remember right, she came out for a finale at a previous GUMF, performing in what we might call scatting and taking an effective and amazing solo section. This will be another gorgeous textural addition to the fest.
Bassekou Kouyate feat. Weedie Braimah & the Hands of Time Acoustic
Bassekou was a performer at GUMF ’23 and this time is paired with Weedie Braimah, another past GUMFer as part of Bokante and other groups. Bassekou plays the West African ngoni (lute) and Weedie’s Hands of Time will be a great pairing that sets GUMF apart as a unique musical journey.
The Joy Lapps Project feat. Larnell Lewis
When the fest lineup was announced, The Joy Lapps Project was the one that popped out to me as the MUST SEE set. Steel pan music is one of my personal favorites going back to Robert Greenidge (Jimmy Buffet), Dave Samuels (Spyro Gyra), Andy Narell and of course Jonathan Scales who performed at several GUMFs.
Joy’s latest album ‘Girl In The Yard’ is incredibly beautiful, happy music, guaranteed to lift your spirits. It’s got beautiful melodies and some excellent instrumentation including flute and sax. And of course with Larnell providing the pocket it’s gonna be unbelievable.
Marcus Strickland And Twi-Life
Marcus plays sax and bass clarinet and his latest album The Universe’s Wildest Dream, is “an eclectic Afro-Futuristic soundtrack, geared towards raising awareness of the miraculous Planet Earth through Pan-African aesthetics, bringing together many genres of black music.” according to his BandCamp page. FunkCity.net loves sax and bass clarinet (like what Chris Bullock did on some Empire Central tracks) and it looks like Marcus is the only featured artist representing those instruments. I’m ready to be a big fan convert.
