Nubya Garcia

The daughter of a Trinidadian and Tobagonian film director and a Guyanese mother, Nubya Garcia was born in London in 1991. After studying violin and viola at the London Symphony Orchestra School, the young musician began learning the saxophone at the age of 10 and followed specialist training at the Royal Academy of Music, then at the Berklee College of Music summer school in Boston. Graduating from Trinity College London in 2016, she began her career as a leader the following year with the album Nubya's 5ive, released by the Jazz re:freshed label and followed by festival performances. A member of the groups Nérija and Maisha, Nubya Garcia recorded the EP When We Are (2018), in which she experimented with electronic sounds, then multiplied collaborations with Makaya McCraven, Theon Cross, Moses Boyd and Shabaka Hutchings' group Sons of Kemet. A North American tour and a residency at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club followed, as well as DJ appearances, before returning to the studio for the album Source (2020), critically acclaimed and nominated for the Mercury Prize. That same year, her concert planned for the Glastonbury Festival was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Between appearances at the BBC Proms and the Royal Albert Hall, the saxophonist joined the collective London Brew with whom she recorded an album inspired by Miles Davis' Bitches Brew. She then worked on the album Odyssey (2024) with her usual partners Kwes, Daniel Casimir and Joe Armon-Jones and with the participation of Esperanza Spalding and Georgia Anne Muldrow. It reached the top of the British blues and jazz charts.