Danibel Breton was born on November 13, 1997, at the Santiago Rodriguez General Hospital in San Ignacio de Sabaneta.

She is the second daughter of Mr. David Breton and Mrs. Maribel Breton.

When she was a few months old, her family moved to Santo Domingo East in search of better opportunities. She was always a happy child, intelligent and very dedicated to her studies.

Her mother recalls that in her first years of school when Danibel arrived home she immediately took out her school supplies and began to do her homework.

She has always shown a vocation for painting, the arts and she loved to sing and dance. She participated for several years in the dance ministry in her parish.

His interest in typical music was born at the age of thirteen. Accordionist Reyes Pilarte would go to La Barbie’s house to teach her father, David Breton, how to play.

One day after witnessing several accordion lessons Danibel asked her father for the accordion and performed the merengue “El puente seco” much better than her father. After that day she started taking weekly accordion lessons with Reyes Pilarte, a native of Los Bombones, Santiago Rodriguez.

Her first stage performance was at El Rincón Santiago Rodríguez where Bartolo Alvarado El Ciego de Nagua, gave her the opportunity to play for the first time.

Maestro Bartolo Alvarado was very impressed by her playing at such a young age. When he felt Danibel’s face with his hands, El Ciego de Nagua said: “She is a doll”, and from there Danibel Breton’s first artistic name was born: “La Muñeca del acordeón” (The Accordion Doll).

A few weeks later they discovered that there was already an accordionist with the name “La Muñeca”, so Danibel Breton was baptized as “La Barbie del Acordeón” because of her similarity to the popular doll with blonde hair and light eyes.

Other artists that gave her participation on stage before she launched herself professionally were: Narciso El Pavarotti, Manny Jovany, El Prodigio, La Reyna Maria Diaz, Banda Real, among others. These presentations helped her to grow as an artist, to fall in love with the stage and to discover her passion for typical music.

Along with her music, accordion and singing lessons, Danibel Breton studied English, Voiceover and Accounting before working professionally in music. At the present time she continues to receive singing lessons and is studying law, which she started at the Universidad Católica del Este (UCADE) and continued in Santiago at the UAPA University.

Since she wrote her first merengue with the help of her father and older sister, she and her family have dreamed of launching the musical project of Accordion Barbie.

As God’s timing is perfect, the opportunity to start the project professionally presented itself at the beginning of 2018, when David Breton, Barbie’s father and an ensemble of typical music professionals carefully selected each of the musicians and arrangers that are part of La Barbie del Acordeón.

On September 29, 2018 at The New Monte Bar, in Santiago de los Caballeros, the grand Debut of “La Barbie el Acordeón” took place. Danibel Breton narrates that she says she felt very excited to see her dream come true.

For her, playing typical music is an opportunity to represent Dominican women in the new generation of perico ripiao artists, to preserve the merengue derecho or “de línea” and at the same time to make modern songs to captivate a young audience.

Home

The drum, tumbadora or conga as a soloist instrument in Cuban music or jazz bands, had as its first figure Chano Pozo, who, upon receiving the invitation of Mario Bauza and Dizzy Gillespie to participate in his big band, turned the world of jazz upside down.

This explosive union resulted in compositions such as Manteca or Tin Tin Deo.

They also created the roots of what is known today as Latin Jazz, which was originally called Afro Cuban Jazz “Cubop”.

After the surprising death of Chano Pozo, figures such as Cándido Camero, Carlos “Patato” Valdés, Mongo Santamaría, Armando Peraza, Tata Guines and Ray Barretto emerged who gave development and personality to the conga drum as a solo instrument.

It should be noted that Ray Barretto was born in New York and is of Puerto Rican descent.

He would be the first important figure in the world of conga drumming not born in Cuba. As a teenager, Barretto took care of his siblings in the evenings while his mother worked and spent hours listening to the radio.

There he was influenced by jazz and, in addition, his mother listened to Cuban and Puerto Rican music at home. This is how he formed his taste and love for music.

Mario Bauzá

He was a saxophonist in Justo Azpiazu’s orchestra and trumpet player in the Machín Quartet. Later, he joined Chick Webb’s orchestra as principal trumpet. In 1933 he was named director of the orchestra, and remained as such until 1937. Between 1937 and 1939 he played with the orchestras of Don Redman and Fletcher Henderson. And in 1938 he joined Cab Calloway’s band.

We can also affirm that Mario Bauzá is the musical godfather of two great jazz legends: Ella Fitzgerald and Dizzy Gillespie. Because it was Bauzá who made Calloway meet the then young trumpeter John Birks Gillespie, and Chick Webb incorporated Ella Fitzgerald into his band.

Chano Pozo

Luciano Pozo González, better known as Chano Pozo was born in Havana Cuba on January 7, 1915 and died in New York, December 3, 1948, was a Cuban percussionist, half brother of trumpeter Félix Chapolín.

Percussion instruments are instruments that produce sound when struck, shaken or percussed in some way.

This percussion can be done with drumsticks, with metal bars, with the hands, with keyboards or by striking two bodies against each other. This wide variety of possibilities allows for a wide range of sounds and types of instruments.

He shined shoes and sold newspapers, played music in many places and even danced in the well-known Havana comparsa of “Los Dandy”.

He belonged to the Abakuá Secret Society, which explains the perfect mastery he had of the drums of the rite. He had the habit of playing sacred rhythms on his congas, as well as singing Abakuá and Yoruba songs.

He worked in the public transmissions of the radio station Cadena Azul, together with figures of the stature of Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, being with Dizzy when he popularized the well-known theme of “Manteca”.

Dizzy Gillespie

He was born on October 21, 1917 in Cheraw, South Carolina.

Son of a bricklayer and occasional musician who treated him very badly.

The young Gillespie hit on everyone: “I was a devil, a strong devil”.

At the age of fourteen, he began playing the trombone, but soon switched to the trumpet, which he was already playing proficiently when his family moved to Philadelphia in 1935. There he got his first important contract with Frank Fairfax’s orchestra.

His life changed as he transformed from a thug in his youth to a true citizen of the world, supporting social causes such as racial integration.

Ray Barretto

Of Puerto Rican parents from Aguadilla, Raymundo Barretto Pagan was born on April 29, 1929 in Brooklyn, New York. He spent his childhood and youth in the Bronx and Spanish Harlem.

He grew up with his mother Dolores Pagan and his siblings Cecilia and Ricardo.

As a child, when he was only 10 years old, he listened to Arsenio Rodríguez, Machito, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Harry James, Los Panchos, Pedro Flores, Daniel Santos and Miguelito Valdez.

At the age of 17, in 1946, he joined the U.S. Army.

In Germany he discovered his taste for music represented in Bebop, listening to the songs “Shaw Nuff” by Charlie Parker with Dizzy Gillespie and “Manteca” by Dizzy Gillespie with the Cuban Chano Pozo, who became his source of inspiration. It was at that time that he became thoroughly acquainted with jazz.

“The word percussion comes from the Latin percussio, a variation of the word percussus, which refers to the action of striking, shaking or vibrating something repeatedly.”

Percussion instruments have a great importance in music because, within a group of instruments, their usual function is to mark the rhythm of the piece. This means that they are often seen as the heartbeat of a musical composition.

Because of their primary role in creating and maintaining the rhythm of a piece, percussion instruments often work in conjunction with bass instruments, including the double bass or electric bass.

There are a large number of percussion instruments that can be classified according to different criteria. In this article you can find the most important classifications used today.

Many of these instruments are simple and rudimentary. It is due to their simplicity that percussion instruments are the oldest in the history of mankind.

The evolution of technology and music gradually allowed the development of more complex instruments, among which are wind instruments and stringed instruments.

Sources:

https://www.instrumentosdepercusion.com/

http://clasica.latinastereo.com/Salsero-del-mes/Mario-Bauza

http://old.latinastereo.com/html/genteLatina/salseroMes/RayBarretto/cronologia.shtm

 

Barquisimeto, is well known as the musical capital of Venezuela and in this opportunity we will make special mention to the musician José Jesús Mosquera Cañizales, born in our city in the Antonio María Pineda Hospital, on May 23, 1969, son of Rafael Mosquera and Juana Cañizales, married to Yolanda García and from this union were born their children Yolanda José and Luis José.

Mosquera was always inclined to music since he was a child, participating in the musical activities of his school “Ciudad Bolivar”, located on Carrera 13 and 48th Street, in Barquisimeto, singing and playing the cuatro in a self-taught way and with the help of his father who taught him to improve his playing.

At the age of 8 he studied at Pablo Canela’s academy, at the age of 10 he learned to play guitar, also with the support of his father and his cousin Carlos Romero.

At the age of 11 he participates in the musical groups of the Christian church, standing out as a guitarist, drummer and timbalero. When he turned 15, he became interested in playing the bass guitar and during his high school studies at the Ezequiel Bujanda Combined Cycle, he met Jesús Rincón, also a musician, and joined the ranks of the “Obeligaitas” bagpipe group, where he began his career as a bass player.

When he turned 18 years old, he was part of the staff of the group “Tecnogaitas” of the Tecnológico Antonio José de Sucre and simultaneously he was bassist of the band “La Salle”. Afterwards, he is recommended to Alí Rojas and auditions to be the bassist of the “Sonora de Alí”, where he remains for 3 years.

Alí Rojas gave him the responsibility of being the bassist of the dance orchestra “Sensación”, where he remained for 15 years. In 1992, he began working as a music instructor for the Fundación del Niño until 1996.

Mosquera, besides being an excellent bass player, plays string instruments such as the cuatro, guitar and requinto

In 1993, Mosquera turned to romantic music and created the duet “Génesis” with his friend and compadre Carlos Enrique Prince, performing in nightclubs and private parties. In 1997, he joined the Poliboys Orchestra of the General Command of the Lara State Police as a bass player, where he currently works. In 2004 he began his musical studies at the Vicente Emilio Sojo Conservatory and graduated as an academic musician in 2009 with excellent grades. José has performed on regional television stations demonstrating his qualities in various prestigious programs and in 2016, he won 3rd place in the Police Voice Festival.

Mosquera, at what date do you become interested in salsa as a musical genre?, Professor Carlos in 2007 I start playing the baby bass and in 2011 I join the K’dencia Latina Orchestra of Carlos Sanchez and also had the privilege of accompanying Benjamin Rausseo “El Conde del Guácharo”, performing with his band and with K’dencia Latina, accompanied the late Willy Rodriguez, and vocalists of national and international renown: Hildemaro, Pibo Márquez, Charlie Guzmán, Alejandro Mayora, Mariana “La Sonera de Venezuela” and the official doubles in Venezuela of Rubén Blades (Jhony Heredia) and Celia Cruz (Ibrahíma Rondón).

Mosquera finally told us that musical excellence is achieved through perseverance and dedication.

Finally we wish the best of success on behalf of International Salsa Magazine, to the excellent musician José Mosquera “The bodybuilder and elegant bass”.

See you next time and let’s keep on salsaing!

José Mosquera “The bodybuilder and elegant”.

 

By Carlos Colmenares, ISM Correspondents, Barquisimeto, Venezuela