Andrew Scott Potter

Andrew Scott Potter moved to New York in 1978 where he first worked for Alex Foster and Michael Wolff and others. Living in New York really tightened Andrew’s knowledge of Jazz, but Rio is where he really honed his knowledge of Samba (a Brazilian dance of African origin). This was also the beginning of his learning about the incredible Brazilian culture.

In various trips to Salvador and working extensively with Afro-Brazilian dancer, Edi Machado. Potter played a lot of Afro-Brazilian drums for dance music. Candomblé was one of the cultures he learned.

Those who know, account huge amounts of popular rhythms to Candomblé Rhythms. can be traced. Potter found this assumption intriguing as there was a recognition of his Brazilian Rhythm concepts.

To his surprise, the Candomblé Ketu uses sticks on the drums, not hands. He realized that various rhythms matched very powerfully with jazz rhythms. For example, Bravum has the swing beat in it like an Art Blakey or Philly Jo Jones lick. Bravum is like the whole swing era.

Andrew Scott Potter’s motives are simple, he wants to share this tremendous discovery. “Make no mistake,” he asserts, “no one else has made this detailed connection!”

Bons Ritmos Records was co-founded by Andrew in 1986 and released 16 CDs including two Billboard World Music charting CDs by Edi Machado. Although Potter’s wife and son were huge influences, he was mentored by the late Bira Reis in 2015.

Andrew’s discovery blew his mind in a huge way, in part because there is absolutely no information about these ‘hookups’ between Ketu Candomblé beats and concepts and the innovative evolution of beats grooves and dances in American music.

“All Western styles of music are derivate or descendants of Samba, Rhumba and Jazz,” Andrew points out. “You can draw a connecting line thru them all!”

Potter has worked professionally with many greats and toured many places including Chicago and New York. In 1986, he moved to Rio de Janeiro for a journey to Brazil and has not looked back.