North America

The Rumba Madre and its roots in Basque culture

The Rumba Madre is a Nashville-based group whose characteristics are very interesting and make it different from many other artists and orchestras that have appeared in this section over the past few years.

On this occasion, we had the pleasure of talking with Basque guitarist and tresero David Vila, who revealed the most important details about the creation of The Rumba Madre and his own musical career before and after the group, so just sit tight because there is a very interesting story coming on.

guitarrist David Vila — Basque guitarist and tresero David Vila, who kindly talked to us

Music in David’s childhood

When David was just a little boy, in his entire family, only his grandfather liked to sing. In contrary to the case of many other artists we have had the pleasure of interviewing here, David does not come from a family of musicians, but that did not keep him from developing a taste for this artistic side over time.

Being very small, his parents moved from Galicia to the Basque Country to work and seek a new life. In this autonomous community, the cultural environment turned very lively and punk and other similar rhythms were at their peak of popularity, which got him interested in the tuna guitar and other instruments. He also started listening a lot to jazz and blues, which became fashionable in those years.

Since David had no possibility to be formally educated in music, he just listened carefully and imitated the sounds the best he could until he decided that he needed to go one step further in his budding career as a musician. It was then when he moved to London, England, to study his degree in guitar. He had already worked as a musician in Spain, so this work experience was very useful to what he would do later on.

Aside from having obtained his degree in music, David also toured around Europe with some local bands, which he continued to do in the United States when he moved to Nashville.

Currently, he is a Hispanic popular music professor at the university level, so he teaches everything he has learned to young people who want to follow his same path.

Rubén Darío, Benjamín Alexander, and David Vila — Nicaraguan guitarist Rubén Darío, Puerto Rican bassist Benjamín Alexander, and Basque guitar player David Vila

Nashville

The first U.S. city David went to live in was Chicago because he was very interested in exploring the blues and other genres from that part of the country, but David did not have the visa required for entry into the U.S. at the time, so his plans to go there were inevitably postponed. When he was finally able to travel, he had no choice but to go to Nebraska and stay there for about two years for lack of a better option.

Subsequently, he chose the city of Nashville as his final destination because of the large amount of musicians who live and work there. He even went so far as to call this place ”The Disneyland of musicians” because of all the opportunities it presents in this area.

Another positive aspect for artists is that there are a lot of well-known record labels and studios to work with, making it an excellent choice for artists looking for a place to start or continue their careers. The locals themselves call it ”the music city” and have a saying that goes ”the worst waiter is a better musician than you,” making it clear how music is perceived in Nashville.

David’s inclination for Latin music

In England, David had already been studying some flamenco and, while it is true that he was not an expert yet, there were not many musicians in Nebraska who played that genre, so he caught the attention of many of his colleagues and groups that requested his services. The same thing happened in Nashville and the fact that he spoke Spanish reinforced the idea that he played Latin music.

The above led many to believe that David was capable of playing both Flamenco and Cuban music without any problem, which was not entirely certain at the time. This is how he ended up playing guitar in a Cuban son band, thanks to which he had to learn to play the Cuban tres in order to be in the band.

Although at first, it was too complicated for him, he focused on practicing a lot and listening to recordings of treseros to be able to imitate them as well as possible. Thanks to his effort and commitment, David learned how to play it and he spent five or six years doing it until he created his own group, The Rumba Madre.

David laughingly recalls that his goal when moving to Nashville was to play country music as he did in England, but there were so many country musicians that he chose to explore another niche and ended up studying and playing Latin and Caribbean music.

The Rumba Madre

After all the experience gained by David in those years, he thought it was time to create his own project and, for this, he chose two colleagues he met in that same musical context in Nashville, Nicaraguan guitarist Rubén Darío and Puerto Rican bassist Benjamín Alexander.

The three artists coincided many times in different bands and concerts in which they played together, so they already knew each other’s styles very well. Since they were all Spanish-speaking, migrants and musicians, they saw that they had many things in common and established a friendship that led to a band.

Both David and Ruben took advantage of the many compositions they had made in recent years and used them as repertoire for the project that was coming. Not much time would pass before music venues and festivals began to take them into account.

On one such occasion, they met Cultura Profética keyboardist and composer Iván Gutiérrez Carrasquillo, who had lived in Miami his whole life, but decided to try his hand in Nashville, Gutiérrez was so impressed with the music made by The Rumba Madre that he proposed them to make an album. He also acted as a contact point for The Rumba Madre to be in touch with companies and labels that would be key to the success of the group later.

They were going to release their first album in 2020, but could not present and promote it due to the pandemic, so they had no choice but to wait for things to die down.

So far, The Rumba Madre has experimented with rumba, punk, Cuban son, salsa, flamenco, tango and many other genres.

Producer and saxophonist Martin Franco talks about his passion for music

Martin Franco is a talented New York’s producer, sound engineer, composer, vocalist, percussionist and saxophonist who has had a big trajectory in music, which he shared with us in a half-hour conversation we had.

The artist of Colombian parents has been kind enough to reveal some of the most important details of his artistic career and the process by which he has managed to become the professional in the music field he is today, so we hope the information revealed here will be liked by those who usually follow our publications.

Martin, founder of Mambo Soul Band — This is Martin Franco, saxophonist and founder of Mambo Soul Band

Martin’s interest in music while still a child

Something important we did not know about Martín is that, although both his parents are Colombian, they moved to Mexico when he was little and he spent the first eight years of his childhood in that country, before moving to Laredo, Texas.

At his new school in the US, he and his classmates were allowed to choose the instrument they liked most to learn to play it and the boy chose the saxophone, as he thought it was ”the most beautiful” at the time.

When Martin began his training, he discovered that he had a real taste for music and began to see it as a pleasant pastime and not an obligation, which led his mother to buy him his own saxophone and tell him to ”throw forward to music” if that was what he liked.

When he turned 12, the family moved back to New York, where Martin started to take music more seriously and meet people related to the industry. That was when percussion and tropical music also caught his attention, as Texas was packed with Mexican cumbia and other such rhythms.

On the other hand, New York had an immense Puerto Rican community and even his own aunts had married Puerto Ricans. Since this was the dominant community in the city in those years, Martin began hearing the conga, the keyboard, the trombone, the timbales and all the music made by the Fania. It was then when his musical tastes and plans began to change.

Martin and the rest of the group — Martin Franco and the rest of his orchestra Mambo Soul Band

Martín’s beginnings in music in New York City

When he arrived in New York, Martin was not old enough to start a professional career, so he was engaged to play with friends in the streets, houses, apartments and private parties. However, this time helped him a lot to gain experience and his family was a great support in all this.

Martín, his family and some of his friends used to go to see live Latin artists and orchestras such as Celia Cruz, Héctor Lavoe, Tito Puente, Eddie Palmieri, Ray Barretto, Mongo Santamaría, among others. This also represented part of his motivation to do salsa in the future, although he also liked American jazz, which features the saxophone, his favorite instrument.

The mix of Latin and American genres resulted in the music that became popular in those years, and the music Martin makes today has much of what he learned back then. It was a mix of Caribbean tropical rhythms, jazz and American funk.

The musician considers that American and Latin rhythms have complimented each other over the years and he always tries to unite them in his performances, just like English and Spanish.

Mambo Soul Band

The name ”Mambo Soul Band” is a mixture of ”mambo”, which means ”to greet someone” or ”to communicate” in some African dialects, and ”soul” in English. This resulted in something like ”to communicate from the soul”, a concept that fascinated Martin. At the same time, both are the names for well-known musical genres, the one Latino and the other American.

He selected these genres as the name of his band because they contain what influenced him musically speaking. Latin jazz, soul and funk were the genres on which Martin based his songwriting for the band he was creating and he hired musicians who had experience with these rhythms. And in case they do not master any of them, he teaches them.

According to Martín, guitarists and bassists are the ones who usually have more problems when playing or learning to play these genres, while a percussionist usually has a greater dominion over these areas.

Another variant of the same project also led by Martín is Mambo Soul Jazz, which offers music and songs much more inclined to the American way. Mambo Soul Jazz is more aimed at quiet events where people do not usually dance much and just want background music to enjoy the evening.

The choose of one or the another will vary depending on the public of the day, although the basis of everything is always Latin music.

Martin performing live — Martin Franco and Mambo Soul Band performing live

The most challenging aspects of the Latin music scene

In the view of Martin based on his experience, one of the most challenging things for him and his musicians is the economic issue. At the level where they are, they do not make big profits from their work, which contrasts to the high cost of living in California.

This situation has led many of the musicians to have parallel jobs that allow them subsistence since it is very difficult to make a living from music. The only alternative is to constantly tour with famous groups, but not everyone is willing to do that, so they prefer to work on other things.

In his particular case, he can afford to live only from music because he is the leader of the orchestra and the one who is in charge of getting contracts and shows for the group.

What we took from the conversation

From the beginning, we have noticed that Martin is a man absolutely passionate about his Latin roots and all that comes with them, especially the musical part. He always stressed that everything he does is for his love of music.

It is our pleasure to have the opportunity to talk with this great exponent of Latin and Afro-Caribbean music and we offer him our best wishes for success from now on.

We bring trombonist Félix O. Rodriguez from Santurce to ISM

The beautiful island of enchantment Puerto Rico has always given birth to many of the best salsa exponents of all time and the source of talent that has come out of that place has been inexhaustible. It is always a pleasure to be able to talk with a boricua of those who continue to leave their Latin heritage on high and, this time, it was the turn of the arranger, composer, sound engineer and trombonist Félix O. Rodríguez from Santurce.

It was very kind of the artist to give us a few minutes of his time to answer some questions for International Salsa Magazine and then we will be elaborating a bit on the topics we discussed with the salsa exponent.

Félix from Santurce — Trombonist and sound enginer Félix O. Rodríguez from Santurce

Félix’s beginnings in the music world

Félix’s first contact with music was at home, as his parents listened a lot to salsa, merengue, bachata and Latin music in general. While listening to this music, one of the things that attracted him the most was the sound of the trombone, especially in artists such as Willie Colón, Oscar D’ León, Gilberto Santa Rosa and many others.

Once he reached the seventh grade in school, he decided to take music lessons and chose that instrument to start his training due to his fascination with it, something that today he does not complain about because he assures that he has done very well.

In this learning process, noticing Félix’s interest in the trombone, his father, who was a professional orchestra musician, invited him to rehearsals so that he could soak up this whole atmosphere from an early age. It just so happened that the trombonist of this orchestra could not attend a rehearsal, so they gave the opportunity to the young boy to take his place for that night.

After two or three shows, Félix was selected as house trombonist when he was only thirteen years old. Although he was not old enough to enter nightclubs, he was allowed to be present because he was part of the orchestra that would play there.

Orquesta Innovación and musical arrangements

When he entered high school, Félix began to study a bit about music theory and related topics such as chords, writing for a specific instrument, percussion and other subjects.

The young man worked so hard to train that, at only 15 years old, he was already perfectly capable of making musical arrangements, starting with transcriptions of music existing so far and copying notes from those songs. After several years on it, he finally started writing his own original music.

In fact, he went on to record a couple of songs with Orquesta Innovación (the second orchestra he was in), a couple of original songs that unfortunately were never released, but served as experience for what would follow.

University of South Carolina

Félix acknowledged with laughter that this was the only university he applied to, so it was almost an obligation for him to be admitted. Fortunately for him, it was.

He had to perform some tests with instruments and show examples of material of his own authorship to prove his musical skills. Everything he had learned so far was mostly based on salsa.

Thanks to his effort and dedication in previous years, he was admitted to the University of South Carolina, where he studied music theory and trombone for five years. While there, the musician learned everything necessary about the historical aspects of all variants of classical music, jazz, marching band, orchestral symphony and many more.

The formation obtained in his studies is still useful to Félix in the arrangements he makes today. However, he made it clear that his passion was and still is salsa and Latin music in general.

Félix during a performance — Félix during a live performance

Military life and musical activities during those years

Upon graduating from the university, Félix was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army, following his father’s example, who was perfectly capable of meeting his obligations in the military and continuing to exercise his passion for music without having to give up either.

As fate would have it, the artist met up with a former colleague from Orquesta Innovación, which led them to revive their passion for music and to create Orquesta Ideal, with which he spent eight years at Fort Bragg (U.S. military installation), North Carolina, his first stop as an officer.

Over the years, he was assigned to units in Spain, Germany and Korea. It didn’t matter where he went because there were always Puerto Ricans and Latinos eager to get together to make music, which Felix took advantage of to be in touch with music, whether as a trombonist or a DJ.

When asked if these events in which he was involved in were open to the public, he said yes in most cases, as military bases allowed entry to anyone, but unfortunately that changed with the Twin Tower Bombings on 9/11.

Berklee College of Music

During the last years of his military career, Felix studied production, mixing and remastering at Berklee College of Music in order to go preparing for his return to music once his retirement was official.

In addition to playing the trombone and arranging, the musician also loved production, editing, mixing and mastering, so he wanted to learn much more about all of these areas and thus have more control over his own work.

Given that the Covid-19 pandemic was starting at that time, his hours at the military base where he worked were significantly reduced, which he took full advantage of to dedicate more time to school and continue growing as a professional musician.

Félix recording — Félix in a recording studio

‘‘Con La Música Por Dentro’’

In the year 2021, Felix released his first EP titled ”Con La Música Por Dentro”. In a world still hit by the pandemic, the artist found it very difficult to record and promote his first solo musical work.

He wanted to record with live musicians, but because of this same situation, it was not possible, so there were endless backing vocals he had to do and instruments he had to play himself in order to make the EP happen, so his name is the one that predominates in almost all the credits of the material.

Fortunately, he succeeded to establish a recording studio at home and was supported his friend and singer João José, who recorded voices, piano and bass for the three tracks that make up the EP.

Atlanta

When we wanted to know why he chose Atlanta as his final destination to settle permanently, he told us that he did it to support his wife, who has got a good job in that city. He remembered the time when he started in the army and his wife and daughter always followed him wherever he traveled for his military duties, so he considered that it is time to return everything his partner has done for him and decided to follow her this time.

He had to look a little to meet musicians and re-weave those connections in the industry and the Latino community in Atlanta, so he had to start from scratch in that sense. The good thing is that everything worked out for him and, as soon as he arrived in Atlanta, he was contacted to play with Willie Gonzalez. The bandleader liked his skills as a musician and offered him to continue playing with them, and so it has been to this day.

The Great Pichie Pérez and his brilliant career

There have been many artists who have supported the Spaha Salsa Gallery due to the multiple contributions made to salsa since its foundation. One of them has been the great Pichie Perez, who gave a fabulous interview to the founder and president of the famous salsa museum in New York, Johnny Cruz.

During the video on the Johnny Cruz’s Facebook account, Piche talks about some of the most important aspects of his professional life and, of course, gives his unconditional support to the Spaha Salsa Museum and the labor it has been fulfilling in recent years. Below are some of the most outstanding details of the artist’s life.

Pichie performing live — Pichie Pérez performing live in Peñuelas, Puerto Rico

Youth

Héctor ”Pichie” Pérez was born on September 24, 1960 in El Bronx, New York, the youngest of three brothers whose parents were Ramón Pérez Rodríguez and Haydée Casiano González, both of Puerto Rican nationality.

After the age of seven, he moved with his family to Ponce, a place where a genre called bugalú became increasingly popular and the boy’s father enjoyed that kind of music, which made Piche begin to be interested in certain artists, especially Pete Rodríguez with his song ”I Like It Like That”.

At the age of 10, his parents decided to move again, but this time to Cañaboa Encarnación, Peñuelas. Some time later, he became part of what would be the first band of his career, Los Metálicos Steel Band, with which the artist began to gain a lot of knowledge about merengue and calypso. When this same group became a sextet under another name, Pichie started singing and playing maracas and güiro.

Pichie was working in several orchestras that gave him the experience he has today such as the Adolfo Grana school orchestra, Orquesta La Intelectual, Orquesta La Preferida, among others.

Pichie and Jerry — Jerry Rivera next to Pichie Pérez

Orquesta La Terrífica and Orquesta La Primerísima

However, his big moment would come when he was part of Orquesta La Terrífica, in which he worked as a vocalist between 1976 and 1981. Additional to this group, Pichie would be in six recordings, among them stands out ”La Terrífica. Sabor a Pueblo”.

Some time later, he would sing in Tommy Valencia’s Orquesta La Primerísima, which would give him the opportunity to share the stage with world famous and acclaimed singer Frankie Ruíz, of whom he cherishes very good memories. Although this is one of the groups for which Pichie would be best known, it was not the last one he was in.

For more than 30 years, he was in La Sonora Ponceña, to which he thanked for all that he achieved and learned during those years. However, there came a point when the singer wanted to make his own way and had to make the tough decision to leave the orchestra and start a solo career, which had ”El Sonero del Bailador” as its starting point in 2016.

Pichie and Frankie — Frankie Ruiz next to Pichie Pérez when they were in La Primerísima

Pichie was expectant before the audience reaction to his solo material, but fortunately, the overall response was very positive, which motivated him to release a new album entitled ”Alegrando La Navidad”.

Nowadays, he has an extraordinary reputation as a solo singer and in orchestral formations, but he also obtained great merits as a güirero and maraquero throughout his artistic career. He also had a great participation as a backing vocalist in many productions and recording sessions to which he added his unique touch.

Lengaïa Salsa Brava is killing it in Montréal

Latin talent can be found where you might least expect it and, this time we found it in the city of Montreal, Canada, a place that is cultivating an increasingly large and vigorous Latin music scene. On this occasion, we were thrilled to be able to talk to Giany-Frantz Huyghues-Despointes, who is the leader and founder of the orchestra Lengaïa Salsa Brava.

Lengaïa Salsa Brava is a 12-member salsa orchestra that was created in 2012 by Giany, who was also a trombonist and had some experience in the world of music before daring to create his own group.

The effort of all its members has enabled them to collaborate with great performers of the genre and win important awards such as the Canada Latin Awards in the category of ”Salsa Group of the Year” in a row in 2017 and 2018 respectively.

Lengaïa Salsa Brava has also performed approximately 30 concerts a year since its foundation and has participated in important festivals such as Toronto Salsa Festival, Festival Nuit Blanche de Montreal, Nuits d’Afrique, among others. The group was greatly helped by the fact that its members come from different countries such as French Guyana, Cuba, Colombia, Peru, Quebec, Spain and Venezuela.

This interesting journey shows us how hard this group has worked to achieve a place within the industry and all the potential they have to achieve much more than what was obtained. Today, Giany, its founder, shares a little more about himself and his orchestra Lengaïa Salsa Brava.

Giany, founder of Lengaïa Salsa Brava — Giany Huyghues Despointes, director and founder of Lengaïa Salsa Brava

Giany’s beginnings as a musician

Although the trombone is the instrument for which Giany is known, he started playing the trumpet from 10 years of age, which is when he began his interest in this branch of the art.

An important point is that in French Guyana, the country where Giany was born, salsa is not a predominant genre, since the most played by the French Guyanese is the mazurka, which is very similar to the Haitian compas. In the case of Giany’s family, they listened to a bit of everything, including salsa.

A turning point for the artist was watching Celia Cruz singing on tv one day. The musician had never heard the Cuban singer before and it was an incredible experience for him, as her deep voice, colorful outfit and wig caught his attention at the time.

Because of her deep voice, he thought she was a man, but his mother explained to him who Celia was and, months later, took him to a concert to see her live. That performance of ”La Guarachera de Cuba” marked him so much that he would begin to lean towards music in the future. Today, he says that Celia is a spiritual mother to him, as she was his great inspiration.

Along with being a fan of the Cuban singer, he wanted to learn to play instruments and initially opted for the piano and the guitar, but that changed when his Spanish teacher at school gave him a trumpet and he discovered that he really liked to play it.

Some time later, he graduated from the national school of music in his country and, by the time he turned 18, Giany noticed that his musical skills excelled more with the trombone than the trumpet. This is how he decided to choose the trombone as his main instrument and so it has been to the present time.

He started playing classical music with that instrument but soon discovered that he wanted to return to the genre that captivated him when he was just a child, so he dared to create a group in France, where he studied aviation. The thing is that he went to live in Canada six months later and had to abandon the plans he had at that time.

Founding of Lengaïa Salsa Brava

Giany arrived in Canada with the vision to create another group in his new country of residence, but he did not know any musicians yet, so he moved into action and started placing ads on social networks and other virtual means to communicate with artists who were interested in joining his project.

The results were amazing and there were many musicians who contacted Giany because of their interest in the concept proposed by him. With this group, he started assembling the orchestra in order to give form to what Lengaïa Salsa Brava is today. The orchestra has six years with the same staff and format it presents to the public today.

Huge number of nationalities in Lengaïa Salsa Brava

As for the large number of nationalities living in the orchestra, Giany has said that all ”are part of a big family” hinting that national origins have not been a problem for the smooth development of the group. In addition to that, the salsa brava is a genre widely known worldwide, so the members of the orchestra knew in advance what they were getting into.

To what we must add that these guys work or have worked in other salsa brava orchestras, so they were pretty much steeped in everything related to this beautiful music.

Giany says it is very easy to work with his musicians because they always know how to perfectly interpret what he wants.

Lengaïa at one of its concerts — Lengaïa Salsa Brava at one of its concerts

Origin of the name Lengaïa Salsa Brava

When Giany was looking for a name for the group, he wanted something different and not very Latin sounding. He also wanted people to ask what the name meant, so we have fallen into the trap.

The musician explained that he wanted something that refers to how explosive, energetic and aggressive his music is, so he chose the name inspired by a Tanzanian volcano called Ol Doinyo Lengaï that spews black lava. ”When you see a volcano exploding, you imagine something explosive and aggressive at the time. That’s what we want to reflect with our music”. Also, the fact that its lava is black is something different from other volcanoes, as is the group’s orchestration and technique,

Activities outside Lengaïa Salsa Brava

Giany wanted to emphasize that all the members of Lengaïa Salsa Brava have other jobs and work activities outside the orchestra. In his particular case, he works as a commercial pilot, but in his spare time, he devotes himself as much as he can to his great passion which is music.

So far, Giany and the other members of the orchestra are unable to live solely on music, but they do their best to keep the group together and are there to fulfill Lengaïa Salsa Brava whenever necessary.

Although the orchestra has been a second employment option, it is undeniable that this is their great vocation and the engine that moves his life, so there will always be space for it.