The accordion meets the Venezuelan cuatro for a melding of folk music traditions.

Artists go to New York City to experience a distinctive density of their kind unseen even in cities like San Francisco, where pianist and composer Sam Reider grew up. The landscape of California is important to Reider, but still, he wanted that big city experience. “The cultural richness of New York is unparalleled,” he says. “It’s a hotbed for musicians from all over the world. So no, I don’t think I would have met Jorge in California.”

Jorge Glem is a Grammy-nominated master of cuatro from Cumaná, Venezuela. The cuatro is to Venezuela what the ukulele is to Hawaii – it has four single nylon strings, tuned in a similar way to the ukulele’s D tuning, except that the B is an octave lower.

“He is one of the best,” says Reider, who plays the piano and the accordion, which he discovered in college. Reider serves not only as Glem’s musical partner but also as his translator and biggest fan. “Jorge takes it to a whole new level and he is a genius of rhythm.”

The two met at a Venezuelan house party on the Upper West Side. Glem played; Reider loved the energy and they exchanged contact information.

Soon, the musicians started to play together, moving between Reider’s place in Brooklyn and Glem’s space in the Bronx. At the time, Glem didn’t speak much English. That has changed, but he still gladly authorized Reider to give this interview.

In the dialogue between Brooklyn and Cumaná, as Reider and Glem call their project, the folk traditions of Venezuela and North America meet for happy combat. (Reider majored in American Studies at Columbia University, and fell in love with folk music.) Any scenery would do for Glem and Reider, it seems, when they play side by side, sweaty from the liveliness of the music, exchanging knowing and satisfied glances.

Reider returned to the Bay Area in 2019, after the duo made a plan to record their adventures as an album. Brooklyn Cumaná will be released in the fall of 2022.

“It’s not as complicated as people think,” Reider says about the language barrier. “It was uncomfortable at first, but humor helps and, by now, we even have our inside jokes. Jorge is extroverted and I can see how funny he is in Spanish. He speaks really fast and people laugh. I laugh too, even though I don’t know what he says.”

BROOKLYN CUMANÁ 7pm Friday, Aug. 19. SandBox, 440 Ortiz Ave. #A, Sand City. $35. sandboxsandcity.com