In 1990 Jaime Rodríguez and Marco Antonio Sánchez, both from Colombia, launched Rumbatá by giving three concerts at leading venues in Amsterdam: ‘de Melkweg’, ‘Paradiso’ and ‘de Meervaart’.

Soon enough, Rumbatá, under musical direction of Jaime Rodríguez, had made a name for itself as a leading salsa orchestra, not only in the Netherlands, but internationally as well. Rumbatá was the first salsa orchestra to play in Dutch theatres and music centres, giving concerts before full halls and enthusiastic audiences. Rumbatá also put on many performances in jazz venues and clubs and at festivals including the North Sea Jazz Festival in The Hague, the Sunsplash Festival in Austria, the Neuchâtel Jazz Fest in Switzerland, the Gronau Jazz Fest in Germany, the Luxembourg city festivals, Open Tropen in Belgium, the Tabarka Jazz Festival in Tunisia, the Festival Bahia das Gatas in Sao Vicente in the Cape Verde Islands, the Mylos Festival in Thessalonica, Greece, the Jazzfestivals of Villa Cellimontana in Rome and Montalcino, Italy, and the International Jazz Festival of Ezcaray, Spain.

In Colombia Rumbatá was given the honour of opening the largest salsa festival in the world, 'La Feria de Cali'. This was the first time that a European salsa orchestra had been invited to the festival. The result was an overwhelmingly enthusiastic audience of 30,000 salsa fans, live broadcasts on national Colombian TV, countless radio and TV interviews and glowing praise from media critics. A news broadcast on national TV called Rumbatá 'the big sensation of the Feria'.

For radio and television Rumbatá appeared live on numerous programmes in Holland and abroad.

In 2000-2001, to celebrate its tenth anniversary, Rumbatá presented a jubilee programme, the 'Cuatro Estaciones de América Latina' suite composed by Jaime Rodríguez, Patricio Wang, José Luis Lopretti and Juan Pablo Dobal. The premier was held on 1 October 2000 in the ‘Kleine Komedie’ theatre in Amsterdam, and this was followed by a tour of the national Dutch theatre circuit. The tour was a big success that was to bring Rumbatá back for another tour in November and December 2001 and in January 2002. A CD of the suite was recorded and The Concert Programme radio station as well as the NPS broadcast it live. And in 2004 Rumbatá presented a new special program touring the Dutch theatres "Cantos del Caribe". See http://www.rumbata.nl/proyectos.html

In 2003 Rumbatá created a second band, Rumbatá Big Band, playing only Colombian music.

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