ARTURO O'FARRILL & THE AFRO LATIN JAZZ ORCHESTRA

Arturo O’Farrill leads the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra as a headliner of the fourth Unity Jazz Festival at Jazz at Lincoln Center. The Grammy Award-winning orchestra appears on the festival’s January 16 program, part of two days of music spread across five stages at Frederick P. Rose Hall and featuring more than 20 acclaimed and emerging acts. The detailed schedule is still to be announced.

Born in Mexico and raised in New York City, pianist, composer and bandleader O’Farrill formed the orchestra at Jazz at Lincoln Center in 2002 to bring Latin and Afro-Cuban jazz to a wider audience. The 18-player ensemble describes its work as “a unique combination of big-band jazz and Latin music,” taking on Latin jazz standards, new compositions and commissioned arrangements. Its book includes music associated with Tito Puente, Frank “Machito” Grillo and Chico O’Farrill, alongside works by Antonio Sánchez, Miguel Zenón, Dafnis Prieto, Vijay Iyer and O’Farrill. O’Farrill has worked with Dizzy Gillespie, Steve Turre, Freddy Cole, Wynton Marsalis and Harry Belafonte; Jazz Empowers calls the orchestra “internationally” recognized for its “high-powered blend of latin jazz and the avant garde.”