Henry Cole : The PRAG Electric Quartet

Ft. Sean Wayland - Panagiotis Andreou - Jonathan Acevedo

Henry Cole’s PRAG Quartet explores Jazz Fusion Sonorities. The music draws inspiration from the works of John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Joe Zawinul, Allan Holdsworth, and Steely Dan. Added to this blend of influences are The musical traditions of Puerto Rico, Australia & Greece.

Henry Cole (Puerto Rico) is a shape-shifting drummer whose versatile, multicultural style positions him at the forefront of a growing wave of jazz innovation and cross-cultural 21st-century rhythms.

A Grammy award winner, master drummer and skilled arranger, he draws inspiration from a long line of highly skilled Boricua Pioneers who performed in local, military and jazz bands. His sonic roots - African, Indigenous and European - have been brewing for years and have come together to create a unique, mestizo sound.

Henry Cole became the first Puerto Rican resident on the island - and the second nationwide - to receive the prestigious "New Jazz Works" Grant from the Chamber Music of America for his work as a composer with his group Villa Locura. Cole is also the first Puerto Rican percussionist who has published columns and master classes for “Down Beat Magazine".

A native of Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, Cole started playing the piano at the age of four and fell in love with the drums at the age of nine. The musical romance led to La Escuela Libre de Música de Mayaguez and the Conservatorio de Música de Puerto Rico.

Initially inspired by Latin percussionists Giovanni Hidalgo and Anthony Carrillo, Cole discovered a passion for Jazz and improvised music while attending Berklee College of Music in Boston. After moving back to Puerto Rico, Cole cultivated a reputation in Old San Juan's diverse music scene, working with poets, rappers, Bomba musicians, pleneros, rockers, and salsa ringleaders.

Literally and figuratively, Henry Cole is taking Puerto Rican "sabor" (flavor) to new, unexpected heights. His flexibility, grace and sheer power behind the drum-kit has proven indispensable to some of the world’s most acclaimed jazz groups, including the Grammy-nominated Miguel Zenón Quartet, Grammy Award winner David Sánchez, The Gary Burton Quartet, Quincy Jone’s Global Gumbo, Fabian Almazan Rhizome, The Ben Wendel Quartet, the all-star quartet “90 Miles” featuring Sánchez, Stefon Harris and Nicholas Payton, alto saxophonist Wil Vinson and the pianist Chano Domínguez, a living legend of new flamenco. Also, Henry has recorded and performed with Chambao, Calle13, Residente , Natti Natasha and Draco Rosa.

Sean Wayland (Auatralia) was born in Sydney, Australia and resides in New York now. During his career as a musician he has worked with many great musicians such as Allan Holdsworth, Wayne Krantz, Frank Gambale, James Muller and Dale Barlow. He is well known and respected for his prolific writing, and unique harmony and rhythm, which features on over 20 CDs of original music.

His was a musical family, his father's love of jazz enabled Sean to hear the music of Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea and others as a young child. His father's mother Muriel Cohen was a concert pianist and the first Australian to perform Olivier Messiaen's Catalogue D'Oiseax publicly. To this day Sean is still entranced by Debussy and Messiaen. Sean studied at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in 1992 and 1993. He has had numerous piano teachers including Mike Nock, Roger Frampton, Judy Bailey, and Paul Macnamara in Australia.

In 1999 Sean received a grant from the Australia Council to study jazz piano in New York which helped him to relocate there. Sean has worked for a number of internationally renowned musicians including: Allan Holdsworth , Wayne Krantz , David Binney, Madeliene Peyroux , Tim Miller, Ingrid Jensen, Jon Gordon, Dave Smith, Isaac Darche , Jon Iragabon , Dan Pratt, Ike Sturm, Matt Geraghty, The Three Degrees, The Dangit -Bobbys, Moses Patrou, Jay Collins ,Cornell Dupree, Jesse Harris, Sheryl Bailey, Gerald Hayes, Dale Barlow, Justine Clark, Phil Slater, Jackie Orsascky, Steve Hunter, James Muller and Steve Mckenna. Sean has released over 14 critically acclaimed CDs, He enjoys good food and watching surfing contests on the internet.

Panagiotis Andreou (Greece) grew up in Athens and was enthusiastic about music from an early age. At the age of 16 he played soul music and salsa as a bass player in various cover bands. Then he studied at the Athens Conservatory. There he also learned bouzouki, the shepherd's flute floyera and singing performance, such as in the Byzantine choir; he also explored instruments from other cultures such as the qena and the pan flute. In 1999 he transferred to the Berklee School of Music in order to complete his master's degree at the State University of New York.

Andreou has been part of the salsa band Gonzalo Grau y La Clave Secreta since it was founded in 2001; In 2009 he received a Grammy nomination with the band for their album Frutero Moderno.[2] He also won the 2010 Latin Jazz Corner's Best Latin Jazz Bassist of the Year award. With Sebastian Noelle, Rainer Böhm and Martin Valihora he presented the album Secret Sound Nation (Nolimit Records 2004); the album The Flight of Krali Marko (2006) was made with accordionist Ivan Milev. He also worked with Hüsnü Şenlendirici[3]

In 2006, Andreou formed the fusion trio Now vs. Now with Jason Lindner (first with Mark Guiliana, currently with Justin Tyson on drums), with whom he formed after the debut album (2009) Earth Analogue (2013) and The Buffering Cocoon (2018) published (he also belonged to Lindner's Breeding Ground). He is also a member of the New York Gypsy All Stars, with whom he released two CDs and also toured Europe.[4] He also ran a Greek band Syn...Phonia, in which he also sang. In 2014 he founded the trio Morning Bound with singer Tammy Scheffer and drummer Ronen Itzik.[5] As a bass player he can also be heard on albums by Davide Tammaro, Chris Frangou, Manu Koch and Giorgi Mikadze (Georgian Microjamz 2020).

Jonathan Acevedo (Puerto Rico) - Inventive jazz saxophonist and composer from Canovanas, Puerto Rico. Showed a passionate interest in music from a very young age and fell in love with the tenor saxophone at the age of 12. As a consequence of his great interest to keep developing and expanding his musical craft, he decided to take formal music training in the performing arts center Escuela de Bellas Artes de Carolina while attending summer camps of Berklee College of Music and later on, recently graduated from the Conservatorio de Música de Puerto Rico.

Jonathan draws great inspiration from past and present musical icons such as John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Claude Debussy, Tom Jobim, João Gilberto, Stan Getz, Chet Baker, Herbie Hancock, Michael Brecker, Seamus Blake, Chris Potter, Walter Smith III, Gerald Clayton, Guillermo Klein, Miguel Zenon and David Sanchez, just to name a few. All of which, characterize his genre-bending approach to his dark but driven sound, harmonically rich improvisations and rhythmically oriented compositions.

During his short but promising career, he has performed regularly and recorded as sideman with artists in the puertorican creative musical scene such as William Cepeda, Julito Alvarado, Pablo Campos, Zacchaeus Paul, Andrea Cruz and most notably Henry Cole's Villa Locura. He also has shared the stage & created music with the likes of Charlie Sepulveda, Luis ‘Perico’ Ortiz, Giovanni Hidalgo, Tito Matos, Ramón Vazquez, Angel David Matos, Vic Juris, Ignacio Berroa, Horacio ‘El Negro’ Hernandez, Kebbi Williams, Tim Lefebvre, Derrick Hodge and Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, among others. Actually, Jonathan is currently in the works of his debut album while looking forward to pursuing graduate studies outside his homeland.