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Hill Center is thrilled to welcome Kaleta & Super Yamba Band as part of our free, outdoor American Roots Music Series!

“…it doesn’t take the group long to take their sound from easy crowd-pleasing to an absolutely outrageous combination of Brooklyn and West Africa that’s ready to burn down the house.” – PopMatters

Brooklyn’s Kaleta & Super Yamba Band are fronted by Afrobeat and Juju veteran Leon Ligan-Majek a.k.a. Kaleta. The singer/guitarist from the West African country of Benin Republic lived his adolescent life in Lagos, Nigeria where Afrobeat was born. Kaleta’s guitar chops earned him decades of touring and recording with Fela Kuti, King Sunny Ade, Lauryn Hill and more.

Now based in New York City, Kaleta has been leading Super Yamba Band since 2017. Their debut album “Mèdaho,” which was released by California indie label Ubiquity Records, draws on the group’s shared reverence for the raw, psychedelic sounds that captivated Kaleta as a music loving kid in 1970s Benin. Mèdaho means “big brother,” “elder” or “teacher” and is dedicated to Kaleta’s late brother Ligan-Ozavino Pascal who introduced him to funk and soul music at a very early age. The album was included on Bandcamp’s “Best Albums of Summer 2019” list and two of the songs were chosen for the ABC/Hulu series High Fidelity staring Zoe Kravitz.

Kaleta and his band have also erupted onto the stages and video screens of major music festivals and music publications across the US. They performed at the historic Apollo Theatre in 2019. They even prompted Action Bronson to stop his own show on VICELAND TV just so he could hear more Yamba. They also performed on Adult Swim’s Fishcenter Live show in 2019. In 2017 they rocked Paste Magazine’s Emerging Music Festival in NYC and after that performance Afropop Worldwide fell in love with Kaleta, saying “his James Brown grunts have got to be some of the best in the business!”

The members of Super Yamba Band have honed their craft performing with a diverse range of artists such as David Byrne, Rubblebucket, Yeasayer and Between The Buried And Me to name a few. Collaborating over several years with Senegalese griot and talking drum master Modou Mbenge, known best for his work with African pop star Abdou Guite Seck, was a defining moment in the development of Super Yamba’s sound and the musician’s understanding of the African music tradition. Super Yamba has also collaborated with Ghanaian singer Osei Korankye and Guinean singer Ismael Kouyate.

Click HERE to see the full line up of the Spring 2023 American Roots Concert Series!

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