WILSIFONTES

Music:

Member Since: 8/20/2007
Band Members: WILMER SIFONTESThis highly accomplished Venezuelan musician has been a professional Percussionist for over 18 years. He studied at Roberto Marcano School (part of the Association of the musicians institute), and Fundacion Bigott, an institute dedicated to the study of Traditional Venezuelan Folkloric music. He also studied privately with famous Venezuelan percussionists such as Alberto Borregales,Orlando Poleo and Andres Briceño.Before settling in the UK in 1996, he toured extensively throughout South America and Europe, playing in countries such as Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay, Germany, Portugal and Spain. He has played in some of the most prestigious international festivals around the world, such as Womad (UK 1998), North Sea Jazz Festival (Holland 2001), Beijing International Festival (China 2001), Bath International Festival (UK 2002), Sea Side Jazz Festival (Croatia 2005), La Linea Festival (London 2005), La Linea (Faro Portugal 2006), Kijani Festival (Kenya 2006), Interfolk Festival (La Coruña Spain 2006), and VI Festival de Musica Ximena de La Frontera (Spain 2006) .Wilmer become a regular guest at the yearly Rhythm Sticks Festival at The Royal Festival Hall, playing in 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2004, where one of his career highlights was accompanying master Puerto Rican Percussionist Giovanni Hidalgo in July 2000. He was also invited to tour in 2001 with “SIDESTEPPER” an international British based band which fuses Drum and Bass and Latin music.As well as directing and playing in his own two bands “Ensamble Criollo Latino” (traditional Venezuelan Music) and Conjunto Sabroso (Salsa music), he is also a member of “Voices of Nature”, a Jazz fusion band which featured in last year’s Sea Side Jazz festival in Vodice and Splitz in Croatia.With his band Conjunto Sabroso he has toured extensively, and worked with various international Latin visiting artists, such as Maelo Ruiz, Luisito Carrion, Adalberto Santiago, Ray Ramos, Cano Estremera (from Puerto Rico), Henry Fiol (New York); Rodolfo Aicardi, Alci Acosta and Ricardo Fuentes (from Colombia).He has established himself as one of UK’s leading Latin percussionists, popular both with the British based bands and audiences, as well as with visiting artists, and one of his most memorable performances came in April 2003 when he was asked to play with Grammy nominated Colombian rock band ATERCIOPELADOS.Wilmer is both an excellent musician and teacher, and he is constantly invited to run workshops in Latin percussion, having taught at Southampton University, Essex University, Ulster University, Kenyata University (Nairobi Kenya), University of Strathclyde, CalArts School of Music (California USA), Woldgate College (York), and Rose Bruford University in Sidcup.He has also featured as workshop leader at WOMAD, Bath International Festival, The Barbican Centre, The Royal Festival Hall, The Music and Art Centre in Long Meadow Shrewsbury, and places such as Devon and Exeter where he has guided the recently formed Salsa bands.In 2005 he featured as a guest musician to direct a workshop on Latin music in the London International Guitar Festival. He also worked for three years with the Live Music Now project, which is dedicated to bringing music and workshops to hospitals, hospices and hostels for the homeless. He also helped to develop the musical department at The Latin American School in London, which is one of the first educational projects of its kind to be set up in the UK.He was part of the Salsa Nueva project created by the classical pianist Elena Riu. Having joined her in 2004; together they performed at The Royal Festival Hall, Dartington International Summer School, Swaledele Festival, Warwick festival, Trinity College of music and The University of Strathclyde in Scotland, as well as international performances at the RedCat Disney Hall (California USA), Kijani Festival Nairobi (Kenya).In 2006 he also toured with The Scottish International band Salsa Celtica, and was invited to the UK tour for The Tango Show Romance de Carnaval.Future engagements include playing and teaching at the Balham and Tooting Carnival in the summer, as well as featuring as guest artist at the Festival Encuentro Latino in London in August, and touring with his own band and special guest in the Salsa Celtica 2007 tour.For contacts please write to [email protected]
Record Label: unsigned
Type of Label: None