Snowboy bills himself as the UK's ambassador of Afro-Cuban jazz. After some research, it looks as if he - otherwise known as Mark Cotgrove - is actually what he says he is.

Snowboy - and much of his Afro-Cuban "dream team" band, The Latin Section - has been involved in almost all the significant developments of the genre in this country, and pretty much everywhere else, too, in the past 20 years. His enthusiasm makes what you might consider a narrow musical category seem expansive.

If you are already familiar with Afro-Cuban jazz, you'll, no doubt, already have heard of Snowboy. For anyone less so, the Afro-Cuban jazz sound was probably best publicised, most recently, by Ry Cooder's 1999 film The Buena Vista Social Club.

Seeing any of the cheeky, twinkle-eyed nonagenarians, such as Ibrahim Ferrer, Ruben Gonzalez and Compay Segundo still dancing, playing their instruments and singing with youthful passion of love lost, you couldn't fail to love it either.

Although he is strictly a percussionist, which means he hammered away at a pair of four-foot bongos at Komedia's second even in its Latin Dance Night series, he is everything else too: Singer, DJ, producer and writer. He has released 18 singles and 12 albums, the most recent being 2004's New Beginnings.

He has played with Lisa Stansfield, The James Taylor Quartet and Basia, to name but a few. He was centrally involved with the Acid Jazz movement, helping set up the record label of the same name with DJ Gilles Peterson.

In 1994, when this sound was at its zenith, his album Something's Coming was at number 11 in the indie charts and there followed an 88-country tour.

All this translated into a high-octane performance. His web site www.snowboy.co.uk, says unlike often "overly polished, bland Latin jazz", his is "fiery, up tempo, authentic... reminiscent of the early... Tito Puente".

Even the most lead-footed onlooker couldn't fail to resist the unrelenting rythmn, which makes you sweat just to hear.

The softer, Spanish vocals drew you inexorably to the dance floor, where couples were mamboing and tangoing like pros.

Somehow, the way they moved looked like the sound of the music. Unlike me and la chica, treading on each other's toes. But with such a vital soundtrack, who cares?