THE ninth Rhythms Of Africa will be held April 30 at Miramar Regional Park Amphitheater. Staged by drummer Willie Stewart, it returns after a one-year break.

Last year’s event was cancelled due to COVID-19, but Stewart says his Embrace Music Foundation in partnership with Miramar Mayor Wayne Messam and Oliver Mair, Jamaica’s consul general to Miami, have meticulously planned a comeback show.

Marcia Griffiths and Gramps Morgan are special guest performers. Like previous years, Rhythms Of Africa’s pieces will be Afro-inspired and performed by many of the students Stewart has mentored since moving to South Florida almost 20 years ago.

A former member of Third World, Stewart points out that Rhythms Of Africa 2022 has special meaning.

“Our theme will be celebrating Jamaica’s 60th Independence anniversary, Diamond Jubilee, I would say as an official reggae ambassador, that this will be a great family event,” he said.

Stewart made his name as drummer for Third World during the band’s heyday of the 1970s and early 1980s. He played on their biggest hit songs including Now That we Found Love, Reggae Ambassador, and Always Around.

He left Third World in the late 1990s and returned to the United Kingdom, where he was born. Since moving to South Florida, Stewart has taught the art of drumming to hundreds of children in the region’s school system.