Another way to Afrocuban-Jazz

My music is an evolution in Afro-Cuban Jazz. I am connecting two worlds: the world of Jazz with Be-Bop, Hard-bop, Free jazz, funk, gospel, rhythm and blues, and the world of Cuban music with rumba and Yoruba rhythms coming from African slaves.

 

My music always carries intrinsic Afro-Cuban rhythms from conception to its realization. I am trying to re-invent tradition. For me the rhythms are not rigid. On the contrary, I use them freely to allow intense musical flow, to create a new space of communication amongst the instruments

 

I build bridges between styles, influences, and instruments. My music is hybrid. I play with Cuban musicians but not only. I need to feel diversity also in the band. My music is the celebration of rhythm, harmony and life.

 

I was born in Matanzas, Cuba. Since I was a child I was listening to the Jazz LPs my father was bringing back from his business trips in Europe and Canada. Influenced by my uncle I dropped out of my engineering studies to immerse myself into music, and I started to study saxophone, a passion that is guiding my entire life.

 

I first played with Talla Extra, accompanying Xiomara Laugart, with whom I recorded twice. I toured with the pianist Pucho Lopez in Canada. I collaborated with Afrocuba and Klimax directed by Giraldo Piloto. Then I joined the famous band Cubanismo in a world tour and recorded an album with them. Later I played jazz fusion with Four Runners in collaboration with Dario Moreno, with whom I recorded two albums and won the Best Album at the Music of Andalusia Awards.

 

I played around the world at the New Morning in Paris with Orlando Poleo, at the Montreux Jazz Festival with Klimax, at the Jazz à Vienne Festival, Nice Jazz fest, Montréal and many more in Tahiti, Japan, Spain, Mexico with Cubanismo. I contributed to more than 20 records.

 

While collaborating, touring and recording with major bands I started to feel the need to work on my own music and to go beyond my Cuban roots into a personal quest of my Identity and my Origins.

 

In 2002 I released IDENTITY first CD as a leader featuring Omar Sossa, Sherman Irby and Tata Güines. The CD received very positive reviews worldwide and was selected in the top 10 Latin jazz album of the year by French Magazine Jazz Hot.

 

In 2005 the Star Tribune of Minneapolis compares my tenor saxophone solo to one of the level of Micheal Brecker.

 

In 2010 I felt ready to launch a new CD and I released ORIGENES with the Nardy Castellini Quintet. The Album uncovers a new direction in Cuban jazz with ancestral Afro-Cuban rhythms fusionned with jazz.

 

Jesse Chuy Verela of the San Francisco Chronicle said: “On his second record album as a leader, Cuban saxophonist Nardy Castellini creates a super jazz offering that defines him as an artist beyond category”

 

In 2012 I joined the World Tour of Rodrigo Y Gabriela and C.U.B.A in  an incredible world tour of 46 concerts in 7 months including 3 major TV shows, amongst them Jay Leno.

 

Since 2012 I am working with a new group of musicians in Paris including Orlando Poleo. We are playing in different places in Paris and I am working on new compositions. We played in Corsica, Geneva, and Nantes early in the year and we are ready for much more in the second part of the year.

 

 

Costa Caliente

Cuban Tour 1988

 

Talla Extra y Xiomara Laugart

Cuban Tour 1989

World Tour 1989

Mexico Tour 1990

Spain Tour 1991

Spain and Venezuela Tour 1992

 

Jazz Band Bobby Carcacés

Festival de Jazz Plaza 91 de la Habana

 

Grupo Pucho López

World Tour 1992

 

Afrocuba

Cuban Tour 1994

Latin America Tour 1994

Ronnie’s Scott Jazz Club London

 

Klimax

World Tour 1995

Nice Jazz Festival 95

Montreux Jazz Festival 95

Jazz à Vienne 95

 

Son en Talla

World Tour 1996

 

La Estación

Granada Jazz Festival 97

 

Al Jaima

Morocco Tour 97

 

Nardy Castellini Quintet

Granada Jazz Festival 98

 

Cubanismo

World Tour 97

World Tour 98

World Tour 99

 

With Orlando Poleo

World Tour 2000

 

Blues Band of Granada

Spain Tour 2000

Spain Tour 2005

 

Four Runners

Spain Tour 2001

 

Nardy Castellini Quintet

Released CD “IDENTITY” 2001

Granada Jazz Festival 2001

Identity Spain Tour 2002, 2003

Identity Egypt Tour 2007

 

Nachito Herrera

USA Tour 2004

 

Nardy Castellini and Rasha

Egypt Tour 2007

Khartum, Sudan, 2008

 

Domestic Jazz Collective

Festival Cines del Sur Granada Domestic Jazz Collective Set

2008, 2009,2010

 

RODRIGO Y GABRIELA

World Tour 2012

 

 

Talla Extra y Xiomara Laugart

Xiomara Laugart, 1989

Atrapando espacion, 1992

 

Afrocuba

Recroded in Argentina, 1994

Ecorded at Ronnie’s Scott Jazz Club London, 1994

Arcoiris,  1995

 

Cubanismo

Jesús Alemany, Featuring Alfredo     Rodríguez  1995

 

Klímax

Mira si te gusta. 1995

Anacaona

1995

La Estación

La Estación Soul. 1997

 

Blues Band de Granada

Cuatro. Award best Jazz CD Música en Andalucía (Brass Session directed and arranged by Nardy Castellini) 1999

 

Graciela Jiménez

1999

 

José Parra

De Arena y Coral. 1999

 

Four Runners

Best Jazz and Blues CD at the

Música de Andalucía Award. Co-led by Nardy Castellini and Dario Moreno, 1999

 

Orlando Poleo

 Lo Bueno de la Vida. 2000

 

Funkdatiòn

2001

 

Carmen Carmona

Brass Session directed and arranged by Nardy Castellini

2001

 

Nardy Castellini Quintet

Identity, 2002

 

Nachito Herrera

Bembé en mi Casa, FS. (Including c Nardy Castellini composition : Big News), 2004

 

La Blues Band de Granada

Knocking the Door 2004

 

Greg Byler and the Branded Souls

If I Should See Fire. 2005

 

Nardy Castellini Quintet

Origenes, 2010