Website: http://www.bobbysanabria.com/

Bobby Sanabria - drummer, percussionist, composer, arranger, recording artist, producer and educator - has performed with a veritable Who's Who in the world of jazz and Latin music, as well as with his own critically acclaimed ensemble, Ascensión. His diverse recording and performing experience includes work with such legendary figures as Dizzy Gillespie, Tito Puente, Paquito D'Rivera, Charles McPherson, Mongo Santamaría, Ray Barretto, Chico O'Farrill, Candido, Francisco Aguabella, Henry Threadgill, and the Godfather of Afro-Cuban Jazz, Mario Bauzá.

Bobby, the son of Puerto Rican parents, was born and raised in the "Fort Apache" section of New York City's South Bronx. Inspired and encouraged by Maestro Tito Puente, another fellow New York-born Puerto Rican, Bobby "got serious" and attended Boston's Berklee College of Music from 1975 to 1979, obtaining a Bachelor of Music degree. He received their prestigious Faculty Association Award for his work as an instrumentalist. Since his graduation, Bobby has become a leader in the Afro-Cuban and jazz fields as both drummer and percussionist, and is recognized as one of the most articulate scholars of la tradición. He has been featured on numerous Grammy-nominated albums, including The Mambo Kings and other movie soundtracks, as well as numerous television and radio work. His most critically praised work has been with the famed Mario Bauzá and his Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra. With them he recorded three Grammy-nominated CDs, considered to be the definitive works of the Afro-Cuban big-band jazz tradition. Mr. Sanabria was also featured with the Mario Bauzá orchestra in two PBS documentaries about Bauzá and also appeared on the Bill Cosby show with the Bauzá orchestra. He appeared prominently in a PBS documentary on the life of Mongo Santamaria and on camera in the CBS television movie Rivkin: Bounty Hunter.

In 1993 Mr. Sanabria and Ascensión released NYC Aché on Flying Fish Records (now available on Rounder Records). It received worldwide acclaim and garnered four and half stars in Down Beat magazine, as well as receiving a nomination for Best Record of the Year by the National Association of Independent Record Distributors (NAIRD). In June 2000 Bobby released Afro-Cuban Dream... Live & In Clave!!! on the Arabesque label. Recorded live at Birdland in New York City, it features Bobby powering a big band of twenty all-stars. Critically acclaimed worldwide, it has been hailed by both the jazz and Latin music cognoscenti as a masterpiece, and was nominated for a mainstream Grammy as the Best Latin Jazz Album of 2001. Afro-Cuban Dream...Live & In Clave!!! was also nominated for the Jazz Journalists Association 2001 Award for the Best Afro-Cuban Jazz Album of the Year.

His latest recording, ¡Quarteto Aché!, on the ZOHO label, documents Bobby's virtuosity in a small group setting and was hailed a "classic" by Modern Drummer magazine and critically acclaimed by the New York Times. It was also nominated for Best Latin Jazz recording of 2003 by the Jazz Journalists Association.