Electric bassist Gabriel Espinosa creates an upbeat and cheerful album mixing and matching strings and Latin pulses. Guest vocalist Kim Nazarian is featured on many of the tracks, and she oozes joy on the cheerful “Gabriela” and peppy “Sambatico,” both including fervent solos by tenor saxist Joel Frahm. Most enjoyable is the addition of Christian Howes’ String Ensemble which adds ethereal beauty to “Nostalgia” along with Jim Seeley’s flugelhorn and dreamy “Eres Jovan.” Espinosa displays swinging bass work on the percussive “Papao” with Jay Ashby/perc and Adriano Santos/dr and is festive on “Two After Two” as Misha Tsiganov’s piano dances with Nazarian. This one will put a smile on your face.