IT PROMISES to be one of the best nights of the season; a 12-piece big band playing the kind of Latin rhythms that will defy you not to dance.

Turn up at the Lawrence Batley Theatre at about 7pm on Sunday, August 3, and you’ll get a free dance lesson.

And then when the music begins you’ll be swinging those hips salsa-style with the best of them.

Those wicked Latin sounds and rhythms of Havana will be provided by the much-applauded Yorkshire charangueros Charanga Del Norte.

This 12-piece band boasts the violin, flute and rhythm section bias – rather than brass instruments – that marks out charanga, a genre of Cuban dance music, hugely popular in the Forties.

Flautist Sue Miller, inspired by the playing of Richard Egües from the legendary Orquesta Aragon, set up Charanga del Norte – Charanga from the North – almost 10 years ago.

She has studied charanga in Cuba and has been back there during he last two years to play with its top charanga bands.

She said: “In the mid-90s I was really into salsa and went regularly to the Casa Latina club in Leeds to hear both UK salsa bands and visiting Cuban bands that played there once a month.

“At a dance class I heard a track by Cachao called Mambo which featured flute and violins (charanga) that really excited me.

“When a visiting Cuban musician said he had some records for sale with flute on I bought them from him. One was an old 1950s record of Orquesta Aragon and the flute improvisations on it were spine-tingling. The player was Richard Egues.’’

For tickets phone the box office on 01484 430528.