Overseas Musical Studies
UCLA, Los Angeles
28th May - 5th June 2007

Samba Masala grooving to LA! We enjoyed our first ever overseas musical studies trip to Los Angeles where we gave several performances at the University of Los Angeles (UCLA) campus! From drumming up beats at Bruin Plaza to spicing things up at the grand finale of the Annual Spring Concert, we had tonnes of fun learning from the folks over at batUCLAda and performing for the UCLA community! Our unique brand of Brazilian samba batucada infused with afrobeat, funk and asian ethnic rhythms certainly got the crowd up and dancing at their seats!

In addtion, we also attended workshops by reknowned musicians and bands, such as an African drum music workshop with Raynor Carroll, Principal percussionist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. Other workshops were also held at the SambaLa Samba School at Long Beach, California with Samba music grand masters such as Lula Almeida, one of the founding members of Oludum, as well as percussionist Carlinhos Pandeiro de Ouro.

To top off the entire experience in the city of angels, during one of our performances at the Blue Cafe, we were invited by a producer of Channel 34, a local Spanish channel, to perform live on their morning show! It was certainly one of our biggest audiences ever yet!