Just as Afro-American music has strong roots in religious worship, Afro-Cuban music is firmly rooted in spiritual practice. The most popular and well known is Santería, also known as Regla de Ochá, La Regla de Ifá, or Lucumí
Pedro “Pedrito” Martinez, Roman Diaz and Little Johnny Rivero in a secular setting
The composition is “Tuesday Glory” and if you didn’t notice, it’s entirely percussion.
Left to right the instruments are conga (Little Johnny Rivero), timbale (Pedro “Pedrito” Martinez), and cajon and bata (Roman Diaz)
Recorded February 24, 2010 at Congahead.com studios.
Manteca!
From religious service to secular drum session to Latin jazz, that’s how the music flows – back and forth – and why it remains so vital to this day.
Onel Mulet ‘s arrangement of the Afro-Cuban classic “Manteca.”
Personnel:
Onel Mulet, soprano sax
Jason Marshall, baritone sax
Xavier Perez, tenor sax
Al Acosta, alto
Pedro “Pedrito” Martinez, bata (omele)
Roman Diaz, bata (iya)
Rafael Monteagudo, bata (oconcolo)
Little Johnny Rivero, conga
Composed by Leonard Bernstein for Broadway 60 years ago, West Side Story has proven to be one of the 20th century’s most durable musical creations.
This March 17, 2018, Bobby Sanabria’s Multiverse, made up of some of the finest musicians working in New York City today, will be performing a “reimagined” version of the work’s timeless melodies using the rhythms of Puerto Rico, Brazil, Venezuela, the Dominican Repubic and other Latin American countries.
Sanabria explains. In the reimagined version…
“…Puerto Rican bomba xicá, yuba and plena are omnipresent. Dominican merengue, Venezuelan joropo, Brazilian bossa nova and samba, funk, New Orleans second line, Cuban bolero and son montuno are now included alongside the show’s original use of Mexican huapango, Cuban mambo, cha-cha-cha, jazz, swing, European waltz and orchestral music.
It represents in full force the rainbow that is our collective Latino and African American culture in New York.”
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In 1985, on his second trip to Havana, Dizzy Gillespie was accompanied by a documentary film crew.
The resulting film “A Night in Havana: Dizzy Gillespie in Cuba” captures Dizzy’s spirit like few other films.
The film includes beautifully shot concert footage of his performance at Havana’s Fifth International Jazz Festival, his adventures touring Havana and his reflections on Afro-Cuban and Afro-American culture.
As everyone knows, Dizzy liked to kid around.
He was also deep and not afraid to speak his mind as the film shows.
Featured musicians include: Nasyry Abdul Al-Khabyyr, drums; Sayyid Abdul Al-Kabir, reeds; Walter Davis, Jr., piano; John G. Lee, bass; Danny ‘Big Black’ Rey, congas; Gonzalo Rubalcaba; piano, and Arturo Sandoval, trumpet.
The city of Matanzas has a population of about 140,000 people, about 7% of Havana.
It’s about an hour and a half east of Havana by car along a very well-maintained highway.
It’s one of the most important centers of Afro-Latin music and religion in the world, yet as the subtitle of Miguel Bretos’ excellent book on the city says, it’s “The Cuba Nobody Knows.”
More accurately, it’s the city casual tourists don’t know. Everyone who is knowledgeable about Afro-Cuban music and religion knows all about the city.
Jazz on the Tube took David Amram there (it was his first visit to Cuba outside of Havana) to visit Los Muñequitos de Matanzas.
David Amram jamming with Los Muñequitos de Matanzas in front of their headquarters.
A Los Muñequitos rumba to celebrate the birthday of the young daughter of one it its members.
There are three varieties of rumba: Yambú, Guaguancó and Columbia. You’re looking at Yambú.
Los Muñequitos de Matanzas in concert in Matanzas.
A friend makes us Frituras De Malanga
Alturas de Simpson. It’s a neighborhood in Matanzas, Simpson Heights, and also the title of an iconic danzón (1879) written by Miguel Faílde who was a pioneer of the genre.
This is the view from Ermita de Monserrate. On one side of the ridge is the city and bay and on the other is this.
Everyday transportation in many parts of Cuba including Matanzas: Self-replicating; runs on locally produced, non-toxic fuel; produces organic fertilizer; and environmentally sound
I judge countries on how well they take care of their children. In that category – and many others – Cuba is #1
Matanzas: Those who know, know. Those who don’t, don’t.
Great news!
You can now watch this video – and all Spanish-language videos – with English subtitles. It’s free!
“Keep a green tree in your heart and perhaps a singing bird will come.” – Chinese proverb
Reunited in Havana with the help of Jazz on the Tube, Cuban drummer and singer Gilberto Valdés (89) and US composer and instrumentalist David Amram (87) work through the rhythms of a score together over lunch.
Jazz is an art of innovation, but it’s equally an art of memory, history, and tradition.
Gilberto and David know what it was like when there was a free flow of music and musicians between Cuba and the United States and what a positive impact that had on the people and music of both countries.
They also know the jarring effect of having that free flow cut off. (This was David’s first trip back to Cuba in forty one years.)
At Gilberto’s home, David and Gilberto talk
about the fine points of Cuban percussion.
Gilberto’s son is in Sao Paulo working as a filmmaker and when he visits he brings his Dad Brazilian instruments like this flute and pandeiro (tamborine.) Gilberto and David took them down off the wall where they were hanging and gave them a try.
At La Zorra and El Cuervo – the club in Havana where you can consistently hear great jazz seven nights a week – David and Orlando “Maraca” Valle on flute jam.
That’s New York’s Robby Ameen sitting in on drums. (If anyone recognizes the other players, please let me know.)
After we’ve paid the light bill and sent out the daily videos, this is an example of some of the the “behind the scenes” work Jazz on the Tube does to help make unique musical things happen in Cuba and elsewhere.
If you’re inclined to pay a voluntary user fee for your daily subscription and access to over 2,500+ classic jazz videos, we can always use the help and guarantee the money will be well used. Support Jazz on the Tube here.
Great news!
You can now watch this video – and all Spanish language videos – with English subtitles. It’s free!
How are Camilo’s kids doing? You tell me. Here they are with “Perdido.”
There’s good news and bad news here. The good news is the music itself.
This is a high school band (ENA) and these are mostly underclassmen, new to the band and I presume jazz itself.
The band has only been working together since October of 2017 and this was recorded in late January 2018.
The bad news is that, thanks to US politics, this group will not be performing in the Essentially Ellington competition at Jazz at Lincoln Center this spring, something many of us had been eagerly anticipating.
Here’s the band playing a Cuban classic “Son de Loma,” a composition by Miguel Matamoros that pays tribute to the island’s musical fertility…”Mom, I want to know where those singers are from. I find them very gallant.”
The next piece was a surprise.
The audience clamored for the Philharmonic Orchestra of ISA (Instituto Superior de Arte) to play an encore after a performance of a series of pieces by Ray Lerna of the Republic of the Congo at Havana’s Jazz Fest.
They’d run through all of Mr. Lerna’s pieces – so they played one by their beloved theory and composition teacher, our man in Havana Camilo Moreira!
Next, Camilo’s nephew, age 5, tries his hands at the tambores (drums.)
Surprisingly, drums are hard for the young to get their hands on in Cuba (as are trumpets in New Orleans), so I believe Camilo when he says this was his nephew’s first try at them. Not bad.
A parting picture…
Swedish trumpeter and composer Stefan Johnsson, Camilo and his nephew who is clearly ready for show business.
Johnsson collaborated with Camilo and the ENA Jazz Band as part of Havana’s Jazz Fest 2018. (Note: Sweden is one of 188 counties NOT participating in the US economic blockade against Cuba.)
People who buy the Jazz on the Tube Insiders Guide to Cuba are helping support these efforts and more. All profits go to the cause, the cause being helping jazz musicians in Cuba develop their art and pass it on to the next generation.
Great news!
You can now watch this video – and all Spanish language videos – with English subtitles. It’s free!
