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  • Spanish

Augusto Felibertt

The 4 Ladies of Venezuelan Salsa project

The rumba night is dressed as a woman with the arrival of Las 4 Damas de la Salsa de Venezuela, a project of musicalizers at parties and events to exalt one of the Afro-Caribbean rhythms that most identifies Latin culture: SALSA.

The 4 ladies of Venezuelan Salsa debuted in May 2018, on the initiative of Sol Graffe after feeling that there was no female and group movement as DJane’s or musicalizadoras.

When musicalizing becomes, not a job but a passion, the commitment grows, and so these D’jane’s arrive presenting a different proposal giving prominence to females, with the aim of incorporating into the salsa market 4 women willing to permeate in a movement where the male presence predominates.

Professional and tasteful, lovers of this genre that unites us in one spirit: SALSA, to bring a musical selection, energy and good vibes to encourage salsa dancers and dancers of Venezuela and beyond its borders.

4 Personalities Conjugated in one Rhythm

DJane. Sol Graffe: Born in Caracas, a salsa dancer at heart, she became a radio promoter, TV producer and event producer under her slogan “Sol 100% Salsa” with more than 25 years of experience in the salsa industry.

DJane. Rocío Blanco: Born in Maracay edo. Aragua, lawyer, manager of the Posada Turística África and salsera by birth, dedicated to the musicalization five years ago being the only lady of the aragüeña entity baptized “La Consentida de la Salsa”.

DJane.  Zaire Plater: “La del Melao Salsero”, born in Caracas, economist by profession, salsera by conviction; dedicated to the musicalization of salsa for five years, leads the family project called “El Arepazo Salsero Plater”, where they gather a large group of dancers and salsa lovers to dance and share eating some typical and delicious arepas.

DJane. Zulay Millán: Caraqueña, lives between two passions: Radio and Salsa. She is a teacher by profession and a salsa dancer by heart. Announcer, certificate #55.721, voice over, radio producer, with experience in events and TV production, radio host for 25 years and counting, presenter/entertainer, composer and article writer, which explains her slogan “Soy Salsa y Más” (I am Salsa and More).

The 4 Ladies of Venezuelan Salsa have managed to position themselves with this interesting project in the salsa environment, whose protagonism brings a touch of elegance and distinction when they go on stage uniformed and organized, supporting each other, where camaraderie and good vibes are noted, as well as the demonstration of commitment and discipline setting a precedent, opening the way for alternatives to enrich the forms of dissemination of the salsa genre.

A solid project, which has the acceptance of producers and especially the dancers, who have become an important support for the permanence of Las 4 Damas de la Salsa in the collective memory and the salsa scene.

Sol, Zaire, Rocio and Zulay.

Last March 12, 2022 they were awarded as best musical project 2021 – 2022 event held at Cerro del Avila V.I.P Disco in Caracas, this activity was conducted and sponsored by Libia Ascanio and Edgar Mendoza.

They are The 4 Ladies of Venezuelan Salsa

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/4damasdelasalsadura

Frankie Vázquez “El Sonero de todos los Barrios and still going strong” Guatacando

Efrain is a Puerto Rican Sonero Excélsior, he was born in Salinas in La Isla del Encanto.

His father gave him his first conga at the age of 10, and another one two years later, which allowed him to practice to the rhythm of his mother’s records: El Gran Combo, Cortijo and Eddie Palmieri.

His parents helped him to create his own band at the age of 16 “Los Generales” where he played congas; the band played concerts in his father’s restaurant. Suddenly replacing the singer of the orchestra, he becomes better and more popular. He then dedicated himself to singing, without giving up instruments such as congas, timbales, clave, maracas, güiro and bell.

He moved to New York ’77, debuted recording on Al Santiago’s production Fuego ’77 to Alegre by the young band of the same name; Al liner note Frankie described as “enthusiastic, energetic and full of life”, he always chorused and sang lead vocals on the cut “Nueva York”, his cousin David Sanchez handled the remaining lead vocals. Fuego ’77 lasted two years.

Frankie performs: “New York”, where his very young voice is barely recognizable:

“New York site of opportunity

New York the city I love the most

I have a feeling that one day I would make it big”.

 

In the others, David Sanchez sings and Frankie is on backing vocals. Both are thanked in the credits for having contributed to the sounds.

This album is a wonderful little one, no song disappoints, on the contrary there is a communicative energy from the first to the last song.

“Fuego 77” was a band of young people in their early 20s.

He then spent two years with Sonido Taiborí (Sánchez sang in chorus with Johnny Ortiz and Taiborí ’79 in Fania with lead singer Tito Nieves, founder Ortiz, an outstanding Puerto Rican composer, later left), a year and a half with Orquesta Calidad and intermittently worked for three years with Orquesta Metropolitana.

He joined the “Conjunto Wayne Gorbea Salsa” for five years, providing lead vocals and güiro, accompanying one of the highlights of the Montuno sessions. He replaced Herman Olivera as singer with Manny Oquendo and his “Conjunto Libre” in December 1990, making his debut.

He partnered with pianist Martin Martin, bandleader of the magnificent “Los Soneros del Barrio” Orchestra in 1999.

He has sung with the Lebron Brothers for more than three years, as well as other spectacular company such as New swing Sextet, Leña Moncho, Tony Gonzalez, La Sonora Matancera, Frankie Morales, Delgado Jimmy, Joe Cuba, Jimmy Bosch, Spanish Harlem Orchestra and stop counting with his great success characterized.

He is currently one of the artists who has participated in countless recordings all over the world and even participated as a special guest in the group Dislocados de Ucrania.

His career is very rich and the list of his collaborations that we have just mentioned is not exhaustive.

We hope that the list will grow because we love his way of modulating his voice in each song, with a perfect diction, and his inspirations that enchant us in concert.

Facebook: Frankie Vázquez

Catalino “Tite” Curet Alonso, the most important composer in the history of Latin music.

(Guayama, 1927 – Baltimore, United States, 2003) Puerto Rican composer considered the most important author of salsa music in his country and one of the most outstanding Latin American composers of the second half of the 20th century.

His songs, produced throughout a fertile creative career that gave birth to more than two thousand pieces, were brought to fame by the most famous interpreters of the genre (Rubén Blades, Tito Rodríguez, Celia Cruz, Cheo Feliciano or Willie Colón, among others).

The son of an orchestra musician and a seamstress, Tite grew up in a working class neighborhood in Santurce, where he remained after his parents separated.

He studied music theory and solfeggio with professor Jorge Rubián, and in 1965 he wrote his first melodies for Joe Quijano, one of the best pachangueros of the time.

Are the 100 most listened to songs by Catalino “Tite Curet” Alonso in alphabetical order.

 

1.Adelante siempre voy :Ray Barreto con Adalberto Santiago

2.Anacaona :Cheo Feliciano

3.Adios Adiós :Pedro Arroyo

4.Apelo:(tema brasilero adaptado al Español por Tite para Roberto Roena)

5.Aquella mujer: Bobby Valentín y Marvin Santiago

6.Aqui estoy yo con mi son: Frankie Hernández

7.Aqui se puede :Airto Moreira /versión Ray Barreto

8.Babaila :Pete Conde Rodríguez

9.Barra limpia: Sonora Ponceña y Tonito Ledee

10.Barrunto: Willie Colon y Héctor Lavoe

11.Bandolera :Héctor Lavoe

12.Boca mentirosa(Andy Montañez)

13.Buen Corazón:(adaptación de Tite para Bobby Valentín/Cano Estremera

14.Cha cha ri cha :Willie Rosario/Guillo Rivera

15.CAONABO:(canta TITE CURET/arreglo Jorge Millet)

16.Candilejas:(Versión en Español de Tite para Wilkins/o Graciela)

17.Cabellos Blancos: Orquesta Mulenze y Pedro Brull

18.Callejon :Arabella (para la película Retén de Catia/Venezuela)

19.Camaron :Justo Betancourt /& versión Marvin Santiago

20.Cenizas:Milly Quezada con Perico Ortiz

21.Con los Pobres Estoy :Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

22.Con mi viejo amigo: Larry Harlow e Ismael Miranda

23.De todas maneras rosas :Ismael Rivera y Los Cachimbos

24.Distinto y Diferente: Justo Betancourt y Borincuba

25.Don Fulano: Tito Rodríguez

26.Efectivamente: Joe Quijano

27.El eco de un tambor Dimensión Latina con Andy Montañez

28.El hijo de Obátala :Ray Barreto con Tito Allen

29.Ella está en otra rumba ;Justo Betancourt

30.Ellos se juntan: Cortijo y su combo con Maelo

31.Escucha una voz latina: Conexión Latina de Alemania

32.Estaca de guayacán: Marvin Santiago

33.Estampa Marina :Cheo Feliciano

34.El antifaz:Willie Rosario con Gilberto Santa Rosa

35.El cantar de los pinales: Pacheco y Pete Conde

36.El verdadero aniversario :El combo del ayer

37.Felicitaciones: Cheo Feliciano

38.Flor de los lindos campos Ray Barreto y Adalberto Santiago

39.Galera 3:Ismael Miranda

40.Guaguanco del Adiós :Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

41.Hace furo: Cheo Feliciano

42.Hermano Héctor: La 2013 canta: Van Lester

43.Huracan:Bobby Valentín con Frankie Hernández

44.Isadora: Celia Cruz y Estrellas de Fania

45.Juan Albañil: Cheo Feliciano

46.Juanito Alimaña: Héctor Lavoe y Willie Colon

47.La Cura: Frankie Ruiz

48.La esencia del guaguancó (Pacheco/Pete Conde/primer versión Willie Rosario con Meñique)

49.La Oportunidad :Ismael Miranda con Larry Harlow

50.La Oportunidad: Ismael Rivera

51.La palabra Adiós: Ruben Blades con Estrellas de Fania

52.La Perla: Ismael Rivera

53.La Tirana: La Lupe

54.Lamento de Concepción: Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

55.Las Caras Lindas: Ismael Rivera

56.Las mujeres son de Azúcar: Sonora Ponceña y Luigui Texidor

57.Los Entierros: Cheo Feliciano

58.Luz Negra: Sonora Ponceña y Miguel Ortiz

59.Llevame: Adalberto Santiago

60.Marejada feliz: Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

61.Me pongo yo: La Descarga Boricua de Frank Ferrer

62.Morejon: Frankie Hernández

63.Mi música: Ismael Rivera

64.Mi triste problema: Cheo Feliciano

65:Nabori:Cheo Feliciano

66.Noche como boca ‘e lobo: Sonora Ponceña y Luigui Texidor

67.Pa’ Colombia: Willie Colon y Héctor Lavoe

68.Pa’ los ponceños: Sonora Ponceña y Tito Gómez

69.Pa’ que afinquen: Cheo Feliciano

70.Part time lover:(tema de Stevie Wonder traducido al español por  Tite para Bobby Valentín)

71.Pase la noche fumando: Willie Colon y Héctor Lavoe

72.Pedregal:Justo Betancourt

73.Penas de amor: Bobby Rodríguez y la Compañía

74.Periodico de Ayer: Héctor Lavoe

75.Piano Man: Ismael Quintana y Estrellas de Fania

76.Pirana:Willie Colon y Hector Lavoe

77.Plantacion Adentro: Willie Colon y Rubén Blades

78.Por que adore :Markolino y Chivirico Dávila/Versión Truco &

Zaperoko

79.Plante bandera: Tommy Olivencia canta: Chamaco Ramirez

80:Presencia:Justo Betancourt y Borincuba

81.Primoroso cantar: Pacheco y Pete Conde

82.Profesion esperanza: Ismael Rivera

83.Pueblo latino: Pete Conde con las Estrellas de Fania

84.Punto Bare: Pete Conde Rodríguez

85.Primer Montuno: Andy Harlow con Johnny Vásquez

86.Puro teatro: La Lupe

87.Que me lo den en vida: Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

88.Reunion en la cima: Andy Montanez con la Puerto Rico All Stars

89.Sali porque sali: Cheo Feliciano

90.Salome:Cheo Feliciano

91.Salsaludando:Cheo Feliciano

92.Saborea:Los Hermanos Lebrón

93.Sobre una tumba humilde: Cheo Feliciano

94.Susana:Jose Feliciano

95.temes:Vitin Avilés

96.Tiemblas:Tito Rodríguez

97.Tomatero: Kim de los Santos

98.tu loco, loco y yo tranquilo: Roberto Roena y Apollo Sound

99.Vale más un guaguancó: Ray Barreto y Rubén Blades

100.Vete y Pregona: Justo Betancourt

Curet Alonso, the most important composer in the history of Latin music.

 

Ismael Miranda Carrero “El Niño Bonito of the Fania All Stars”

Where did Ismael Miranda’s artistic nickname “El Niño Bonito de la Salsa” (The Pretty Boy of Salsa), with which he became known, come from?

I liked to dress up and look nice for the presentations on one occasion I went to the hairdresser’s and bought a suit for the show when I arrived at the hotel, Johnny Pacheco said to me: ‘How nice, the pretty boy is late! As always.

And from that day on they called me “El niño bonito de la salsa” (the pretty boy of salsa). Pacheco gave the nicknames to everyone in the Fania All Stars.

Johnny Pacheco had a lot of faith when he came up with the idea of making this movie and it was a success.

People vibrated with our songs and we took advantage of 4 emblematic concerts to record it.

That’s how we have to walk through life. It is enough to know that we are doing things right to reap triumphs. Said the trumpet player and composer.

Perico also took the opportunity to tell where all that tasty Caribbean rhythm comes from, of which they are such good exponents. “The folklore of Latin American music was born in Africa”. He recalled the first time he arrived with La Fania to this continent. He still has in his mind the gesture of the Africans when he saw people from other parts of the world playing the congas like masters. We all felt proud, he said.

Miranda also recalled that on August 6, 1980, he arrived for the first time in Barranquilla to present a concert with Héctor Lavoe.

“We were used to performing on huge stages and singing with a well achieved sound; in Barranquilla there was nothing like that, but something magical happened, the affection and joy of the people infected us.

Hector and I gave a show of height, at the end we realized that we enjoyed it completely with all the people of Barranquilla.

During the conference, Perico Ortiz explained why he never recorded an album with Las Estrella de la Fania.

“I never recorded an album, but I participated in many concerts. At that moment I felt in my heart that it was time to sing and I told Jerry Masucci to give me the opportunity, but he did not see me as an artist, but as a trumpet player and arranger, so I decided to retire from La Fania and concentrated on recording my first album as a soloist in 1977 titled My Own Image”.

Ismael was born in Aguada, in western Puerto Rico, but as a child his family settled in New York. He began singing in English in school plays when he was only eight years old, and was even part of a children’s group called “Little Junior in the Class Mate”.

Soon after, he began taking singing lessons at a music school at 46th and Broadway, and then to improve his singing skills he studied with a music teacher recommended to him by Tito Rodriguez.

The environment in which he grew up helped him cultivate his love for music. First he wanted to be a percussionist and not a vocalist. That is why at the age of 10 he told his mother of his desire to buy a conga. Later he acquired a bongo, which resounded throughout the neighborhood. He got to play the conga in Andy Harlow’s sextet, and was part of the Sexteto Pipo y su Combo. But he finally turned to singing, for which he was assisted by Ismael Rivera.

He made his first recording in 1967 with José Luis Pastrana Santos, a musician, composer and timbalero from Santurce, known as Joey Pastrana, on the album Let’s Ball.

This album, recorded for the Cotique label, contains Ismael Miranda’s first big hit, the song “Rumbón melón”.

Facebook: Ismael Miranda

Ramón “Mongo” Santamaría “I wanted to do something that sounded like home”.

April 7, 1917, Mongo Santamaría was born in the Jesús María neighborhood of Havana, Cuba.

Exceptional percussionist of Latin Jazz and related rhythms, whose first name was Ramón Santamaría.

Mongo left to continue playing his Congas hard in the sky on February 1st, 2003.

“I wanted to do something that sounded like home”. With these simple words, Ramón Santamaría Rodríguez “Mongo Santamaría” spoke of his essence.

The purpose of his music pursued a sonority and a memory, possibly located in Cuba, in Jesús María, a marginal neighborhood where he grew up and enjoyed a tradition attached to the drum, to religion, to the street and from where this great Cuban percussionist drank infinitely.

But surely those drums also came to him from far away, from the Congo, where his grandfather came from to be a slave on the island and who also filled his head with sounds full of meanings and colors, which he later masterfully spread around the world.

The name of Mongo Santamaría (Havana, April 7/1917 – Miami, Feb. 1/2003) is, for the glory of all music, an inevitable reference of Cuban percussion.

Since he was a child he knew that his thing was to play the drum and he was lucky enough to belong to a family of empirical musicians, singers and drummers who supported him in the learning and mastery of these instruments.

During his time in Cuba, already a professional musician, he participated in numerous groups that little by little gave him a place among the most outstanding percussionists of the time. Some names of these groups are El Conjunto Boloña, Lecuona Cuban Boys, with whom he was able to participate in the recording of his first album, Conjunto Matamoros, Segundo Grupo de Arsenio Rodríguez, among others.

Each group had its own style and stamp, but in each of them Santamaría put his personal “touch”.

At the prestigious Tropicana cabaret he played with Chano Pozo as a member of Armando Romeu’s orchestra.

From that moment on, his career would not stop. Conjuntos, Septetos de Son were the perfect selection to complete the sap from which he would draw all his style and technique.

Later, from carnival to carnival, he would gather with other percussionists to play in the comparsas and experience the festive musical atmosphere par excellence of those years.

Alongside him played other friends who soon became a Cuban reference in the United States: Patato Valdés and Armando Peraza.

As part of the Tropicana orchestra and located in a show in Mexico, he decided to settle there as did many musicians of his time and came to play with Pérez Prado and Benny Moré.

It was precisely in the latter orchestra where he met Clemente Piquero “Chicho”, another Cuban percussionist whose style made him rethink the role of percussion in Cuban popular orchestras.

Mongo Santamaría belongs to the second wave of Cuban percussionists who arrived in New York in 1950.

His new idea of restructuring and designing his own style in the use of Cuban percussion was perfectly in tune with the reality that a few years earlier was being experienced in the music produced and sold in New York, after the arrival of the Cuban rumbero Chano Pozo.

“The rhythm produced by the conga organizes all the percussion of a band, from which melodies and counter-melodies can be experimented with.”

“I think percussion is the base from which things come out.”

Already in the United States, Mongo plays with Gilberto Valdés, again he is part of Pérez Prado’s orchestra and finally with Tito Puente’s, where he stayed for 7 years. Once in the line of Afro-Cuban jazz, so popular at the time, he joined George Shearing’s group and later the vibraphonist Cal Tjader.

With his own orchestra, he accompanied La Lupe, one of his favorite singers, and undertook projects of novel formats for the time, such as small formations of brass trio, piano, bass, percussion and drums, at a time when jazz bands predominated.

Mongo Santamaría, perhaps without the theatricality to which Chano had accustomed the New York public, focused all his strength on achieving his own sonority, with a fusion of Cuban styles and genres, perfected and deepened in the introduction of Afro-Cuban rhythms with a naturalness and using colorful timbre elements by using several tumbadoras in his set.

His creativity is highly demonstrated in the great amount of music that is part of his catalog of works and the quality becomes indisputable when seeing the amount of outstanding jazz interpreters that version and recreate his work.

In 1959 he recorded Tambores y cantos, which contains the song Afro blue, which over the years became “a jazz anthem of all times”, according to Nat Chediak, author of the Latin Jazz Dictionary.

His long recording career (50 albums), testifies to the musical activity that this great percussionist carried out throughout his professional career. He worked with American jazz legends such as Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, flutist Hubert Maws, Dizzy Gillespie, trumpeter Marty Seller, among other musicians who today still pay tribute to this Cuban conguero who was the architect of the fusion of rhythm & blues rhythms and Afro-Cuban music, recognized the connection of Cuban music to African roots and placed the congas in an indispensable instrument for the determination of Latin jazz.

In 1977 Mongo Santamaría received the American Grammy Award for “Best Latin Recording” for the work Dawn.

In 1999, Rhyno Record Company, based in Los Angeles, California, recognizing his contribution to Latin Jazz, released the “box set” (CD) Skin On Skin: The Mongo Santamaría Anthology (1958-1995), which includes 34 of his most successful pieces (from his rumba albums, his LP with La Lupe and his projects in the fusion of Jazz and Latin) and an extraordinary literature about his career written by actor Andy García, musician Poncho Sánchez and other connoisseurs of the Latin Jazz genre such as José Rizo, Luis Tamargo, Joel Dorn and Miles Pelich.

The legendary musician was extremely honored and grateful for the distinction Rhyno gave him by introducing this historic anthology to the world. As stated in the conversation with Jaime Torres, Mongo said:

“This is the fruit of many years of work, music made with taste and love.”

May he rest in peace and eternal glory to him.

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International Salsa Magazine (ISM) is a monthly publication about Salsa activities around the world, that has been publishing since 2007. It is a world network of volunteers coordinated by ISM Magazine. We are working to strengthen all the events by working together.