Grupo Ase is a multi cultural collective of professional musicians and dancers, all either trained teachers or experienced workshop leaders, delivering masterclasses and clinics which combine authenticity, energy, joy in music and an awareness of, and fidelity to, tradition.

These masterclasses are inspiring, high quality, and challenging multi-discipline sessions which remain true to the rich cultural heritage of Afro-Cuban music. The styles presented include Batá, Rumba and Bembe; all with percussion, songs / chants and dancing.

These music styles and their individual parts can be deceptively simple or fiendishly challenging, but always demand excellent time keeping skills and a high level of co-operation and interaction between the players, singers and dancers.

The sessions are aimed not only at teaching a vocabulary of rhythms and ‘feels’ in an authentic traditional music, but at inspiring students with a sense of co-operative intent on the bandstand; making the group performance and the interdependence of musicians, singers and dancers the focus.

The fundamentals of Afro-Cuban rhythm, principle among these; the concept of clave, are addressed, as is the cultural and historical context of these musics.

Resource packs with musical notation, lyric sheets, maps, weblinks, bibliographies and discographies are supplied with each masterclass.

‘ A dynamic and engaging ensemble – capable not only of performing to the highest standards, but also of enthusiastically imparting their knowledge and inspiring performers’

-Jonathan Little, former Principal, Academy Of Contemporary Music

‘Grupo Ase kept my students enthralled and sparked off in them an interest in Afro – Cuban music which many of them continue to pursue’

-Jono Podmore, Professor of Popular Music, University of Music, Cologne, Germany