The band
Nolosé, a true salsa orchestra
Lausanne, 2004, a concert night at the Chorus. A programmer from the OFF programme of the Verbier Academy Festival has just heard the workshop band of the EJMA, the city’s school of jazz and contemporary music. She wants these musicians for her festival and asks for the band’s name. It has none. “No lo sé”: I don’t know. The answer just slips out.
From that workshop grew an orchestra, sixteen musicians today, from six countries. We write our own songs, borrowing harmony from jazz and the tumbao from salsa, with Havana D’Primera and Los Van Van on the stereo, and we went to Havana to record them at the Radio Progreso studios.
The next chapter played out far from Lausanne. October 2014: opening for El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico in Geneva. 2015: the Half Note in Athens, then two weeks on tour through the Greek islands, from Spetses to Zakynthos.
Nobody makes a living from Nolosé. Laurent, the founder, plays the congas. When Covid closed the venues, the band carried on rehearsing, writing and playing. ‘It really saved the band,’ says Laurent. And Nolosé has been back at the Chorus every year since 2004.
The band’s history
They come from Switzerland, Cuba, Venezuela, Peru, Bolivia and Poland. The band was honoured four times between 2009 and 2018; it has performed in Colombia, Cuba, Greece, France and Switzerland. The awards, year by year, and the big stages are in thepress kit.
The musicians
The full orchestra, from the singers to the drums.
Edgar LopezVocals 
Sarah FarjonVocals 
Idalmis CuénoudVocals 
Seeler Subero SanchezVocals 
Michaël ConusTrumpet 
Irène HernandezTrumpet 
Franko CasanovaTrombone 
Oswaldo ParraTrombone 
Emmanuel SchwabSaxophone 
Matthieu TrovatoPiano 
Patrick GuenatBass 
Slawek PlizgaTres & guitar 
David LazoBongos & campana 
Marco PerezGuiro 
Laurent CuénoudCongas 
Cyril RegameyDrums & timbales
Who has played with us →Press & awards →Musical style →
Nolosé in three questions
What kind of band is Nolosé?
A Cuban salsa orchestra of 16 musicians, founded in Switzerland in 2004. The band writes its own repertoire, in the idiom of timba and Cuban son. The album ‘¿Qué Cuenta La Habana?’ was recorded in Havana, at the Radio Progreso studios, and received the Premio Internacional at Cubadisco 2014.
Where does Nolosé play?
At the Chorus in Lausanne every year since 2004, at the Montreux Jazz Festival between 2007 and 2018, at JazzAscona, at Caliente! in Zurich, at LakeLive in Biel. Outside Switzerland: Havana, Athens and the Greek islands, and an eight-concert tour of Colombia including the Bogotá Timba Fest.
How many musicians are on stage?
Twelve in the standard line-up: three singers, three horns and the full rhythm section (piano, bass, congas, drums and timbales, bongos and campana, guiro). Sixteen on a big stage, eight to ten for a private or corporate evening. The tech rider for each line-up is in the pro area.
