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Mario Bauza

North America / United States / New York

Mario Bauza, Pioneer of Afro-Cuban jazz in New York, Clarinetist, saxophonist, trumpeter and arranger

Mario Bauzá (Havana, April 28, 1911 – Manhattan, July 11, 1993) was a Cuban saxophonist, clarinetist, trumpeter, arranger and composer.

Known above all for having been the musical director of the Machito orchestra (of whom he was also a brother-in-law), he was a pioneer of what is now known as Afro-Cuban jazz.

Mario Bauza The Legendary Mambo King — Mario Bauza Pioneer of Afro-Cuban jazz in New York

Bauzá played the clarinet in the Havana Philharmonic Orchestra. However, after traveling to New York in 1927 with the Antonio María Romeu orchestra, he was so impressed by the Big Bands of Paul Whiteman, Fletcher Henderson and Tommy Dorsey, and by the Harlem music revues, that in 1930 he decided to emigrate definitively to USA.

During the trip, he became friends with Antonio Machín. Mario Bauzá would return on the same boat in which Don Aspiazu’s orchestra was travelling, who immediately began the arrangements to record El manisero.

Upon arriving in New York, Bauzá went to live in Harlem with his cousin, the trumpeter René Endreira. Bauzá began playing the saxophone at house parties with pianist Lucky Roberts and began to absorb African-American culture.

Mario Bauza — Pioneer of Afro-Cuban jazz in New York

Between 1930 and 1931, he was a trumpeter in the Antonio Machín quartet and made important recordings with this group in New York City. Anecdotally, it is said that he had learned to play the trumpet in just two weeks.

His first jobs were with the orchestras of Cass Carr, Noble Sissle and Sam Wooding.

In 1933 he entered Chick Webb’s orchestra as first trumpet, where he ended up as music director. He then worked with Don Redman and Fletcher Henderson, eventually landing Cab Calloway.

Being in that band, Mario brought the young trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie to the orchestra.

Bauzá married Estela Gutiérrez, sister of Francisco Raúl Gutiérrez Grillo, known as Machito.

On December 3, 1940, he debuted with Machito at the Park Plaza, a dance hall, with the Afro-Cubans, later working for almost four years at the La Conga club.

Bauzá works for Machito as artistic director, taking care of the arrangements and hiring the musicians.

The style of the Afro-Cubans mixes the son montuno of Cuba with features of swing bands.

Mario Bauzá Pioneer of Afro-Cuban jazz in New York

Thanks to this, musicians like Dizzy Gillespie or James Moody introduced Afro-Cuban rhythms into jazz, starting in 1947.

He became interested in jazz when he heard Frankie Trumbauer play the saxophone performing Rhapsody in blue with the Paul Whiteman orchestra.

In the forties, Mario will develop the sound of Afro-Cuban jazz. His work as a clarinetist, trumpeter, saxophonist and arranger in the Machito orchestra constitutes one of the main pillars in the emergence and development of that Cuban genre.

Nicky Marrero is an innovator, timbalero and bongo player, living legend of our Afro-Latin and Caribbean music.

Nicolás Marrero Jr. “Nicky Marrero” was born in the Bronx, New York, on June 17, 1950, to a Puerto Rican father and mother (born in San Germán and Corozal, respectively).

He had formal studies in drums during his adolescence, but more could the sounds of Tito Puente and Willie Bobo, his major influences.

Nicky Marrero is an innovator, timbalero and bongo player, living legend of our Afro-Latin and Caribbean music.

He debuted in music with a high school ensemble called Orquesta Caribe.

However, his first recording session was at the age of 15 with the original band of another teenager born in 1950: Willie Colón.

Curiously, at the time of these sessions, three pillars of the Alegre All-Stars, Charlie Palmieri, Louie Ramirez and Kako, were present in the studio, and young Nicky was invited to participate as a timbalero.

In 1968 he was recruited by Eddie Palmieri, who by then, as a consequence of internal problems, gradually disbanded his original orchestra: La Perfecta.

Nicky Marrero joins the orchestra shortly after recording the album “Champagne,” the album “Justicia” (1969), where, still under the powerful voice of Ismael Quintana, Nicky begins to explore his own sound (listen to his solo in the song “My Spiritual Indian”),

The decade of the 70’s opens for him with three important events: the classic album “Vámonos Pa’l Monte”, his participation with Patato in the album “Portrait Of Jennie” by Dizzy Gillespie and the beginning of his career as a percussion teacher, as a member of the faculty of the East Harlem Music School, the school of Johnny Colón, legendary pianist and one-time pioneer of boogaloo.

At this institution Nicky gives his first lessons to a 13 year old boy named Jimmy Delgado.

In 1972 Nicky is invited to participate in the Afro-American Music Festival. 1975 he joins the troupe of the Wonderful Jew, Larry Harlow, then he is part of the Revelation Orchestra, two years with the Novel Orchestra.

In fact, thanks to his internship with Harlow’s band, Nicky was already part of Fania Records’ staff of musicians, recording as timbalero, bongos player and even drummer (and one of his first assignments for that label as a studio musician was the album “Pa’ Bravo Yo” by Justo Betancourt, produced by Harlow himself in 1972).

In 1973 he was included in the Fania All-Stars, replacing Orestes Vilató.

Marrero received an invitation from Pacheco to make his debut with them at Yankee Stadium in August of that year. Ironically, despite the events that separated Vilató from the stellar orchestra, he remained part of Fania’s studio staff. In fact, Vilató and Marrero crossed paths on countless sessions for various artists on the label between 1973 and 1980, in most cases with Marrero on timbales and Vilató serving as bongos player.

His multiple sessions for Fania (Ismael Miranda, Ismael Quintana, Héctor Lavoe’s first solo album (“La Voz”), Justo Betancourt and others), he also participates in “Sun Of Latin Music,” Eddie Palmieri’s classic par excellence and the first album to win a Grammy in the then debut category of “Best Latin Album.”

He is also invited to participate in the first of several rock sessions, this one specifically as an all-around percussionist for the group Electric Flag: “The Band Kept Playing”.

He travels with Fania to the African continent, later Jerry Masucci gets a potentially lucrative contract for the Fania All-Stars with Columbia Records, for recording purposes the orchestra is reduced to a sextet: Pacheco, Barretto, Nicky, Roberto Roena, Bobby Valentin and debuting with the orchestra, Papo Lucca.

This is how Nicky, without being a band leader, not only became a star member of the Fania All-Stars, but also an “exclusive artist” of the Fania label. And as such, he appears on several albums that are not necessarily Latin and travels with Fania to Europe (the first of several subsequent visits) and Japan. Together with Harlow, Vilató on bongo, Eddie “Guagua” Rivera on bass, Frankie Rodríguez on congas, Harry Viggiano on guitar and Pablito Rosario on percussion, he recorded an album of downloads for the Japanese market under the curious group name of Belmonte (“Olé”). [This album is very difficult to obtain.

1977 he joins Tipica’73, an orchestra which he joins shortly after the release of the previous album: “Rumba Caliente,” ironically replacing Vilató once again. The album in question, for which Nicky alternated between his timbales set and the drums proper, is “The Two Sides Of Tipica’73,” the band’s most progressive album.

Nicky introduces drum toms to his rhythm kit (the only drum component Nicky overlooks in his regular timpani set is the hi-hats).

Nicky even recorded his first drum solo on the song “Yo Bailo De Todo” on that album. By this time, production at the Fania label and its subsidiaries was exhausting and the salsa boom in New York was in full swing.

Exhausting tours with the Fania All-Stars, he travels with Tipica’73 to Havana, Cuba, the first time in 20 years of economic blockade and open political friction that a New York Latin orchestra performs in the home of son, Nicky’s visit with La Tipica and Orestes Vilató’s own visit the following year, replacing him with the Fania All-Stars, helped to restore the timbal and bongo to the importance they should never have lost in Cuba.

To this day, Nicky remains healthy and active in music.

Also Read: The legendary singer Guadalupe Victoria Yolí Raymond “La Lupe”

René Latin Soul and his journey into music from his home country

René Latin Soul

After anything we have yet witnessed in the Latin music scene of the United States, we can say that it is undeniable that Cuba is an endless source of talent and passion for music, so this island can never be missing in International Salsa Magazine. On this occasion, it was the turn of producer, musical director, arranger, composer and trombonist René Latin Soul.

René is a talented Cuban who has managed to gain a very important place in the music industry in this country and we wanted to know how he managed to get there. Do not miss the fascinating conversation we had with the artist.

René playing the trombone — René Latin Soul playing the trombone during a performance

Beginnings in Cuba

René Amet Campos Artigas was born in the province of Camagüey, specifically in the municipality of Nuevitas. He came to music from a very early age, as many of his relatives are musicians, including his father and grandfather. This led him to enroll in the music conservatory when he was only 10 years old.

He confesses that he always knew he wanted this to be his profession and had no other career in mind for tomorrow, so he always did his best to excel as much as he could in the music business.

Once he finished school, René entered the military for mandatory service and was part of the general staff band. He was always intended to move to Havana in order to make himself known as an artist and he finally did it to stay for a while and see how he was doing.

During this time, he was working for several nightclubs that offered live music, but he did it with the trombone given by the army when he was in the staff band, since he just did not have enough money to buy one of his own.

Unfortunately, the time of the ”Special Period” arrived and this crisis forced him to return to his native Camagüey. However, this was not the end of his dream.

Upon returning, both René and his father started an artistic project which they named ”Valentín y Los del Caribe” and started working in tourism, specifically in a company called El Cuartón Club which had hotels in Acapulco, Puerto Vallarta and Ixtapa, Mexico.

Canada and the United States

While working with El Cuartón, René spent a long spell touring in the Aztec country, which gave him the opportunity to get to know other territories and other ways of doing things. In one of these trips, he made the decision not to return to Cuba and try his luck on new horizons.

He lived in the capital of the aforementioned country for more than 12 years, during which time he worked as an instrumentalist and worked with several artists belonging to the salsa guild such as La India, Jerry Rivera, Grupo Niche, Oscar D’ León, Los Adolescentes, among many others.

René on stage — René Latin Soul performing on stage

When he met the woman who became his wife, they started their romantic relationship and began making plans of life in common, between which Mexico fell a long way short, so it was time to put down roots elsewhere. At first, this new place would be Canada, but plans changed and the couple ended up leaving to the United States of America.

René and his wife spent about eight months living in Canada, but immigration issues became very difficult for them from one moment to another, so it did not take long for them to relocate to the United States.

René never thought to live here, since the Cuban government instilled an absolutely negative view of what this country represents in children from a very young age and he was no exception. However, all those opinions changed once the musician began to really get to know this nation. Today, he feels he has adapted perfectly and has been here for about six years, when he moved to this country to establish his family and career.

René Latin Soul & His Quartet

Once René arrived in the United States with his wife, his situation was very complex as any immigrant’s, so he had to work on things that had nothing to do with music. In fact, he recalls he spent more than a year without playing the trombone because he could not devote himself to music at that time.

That was it until he started playing trombone with the Kimbalai Orchestra, which he left in December 2021 and went to live in the city of Murrieta, one hour from San Diego. Once there he met Michael Mora, a friend who advised him to exploit the features of the city to start a solo project, which led him to start a solo career, which he finally did.

As he made a name for himself, he was able to include other musicians in his project, which allowed him to build the quartet he has today. Although René is very happy with what he has accomplished so far, he plans to have a much bigger salsa band in the future.

René and his piano — René Latin Soul in front of his piano

Music classes

A very important part of René’s work with music is teaching and this was a point we found interesting to discuss.

When asked if talent was natural or developed, he said natural. The artist thinks that the ability to play an instrument is innate in the musician, so this person only requires academic training to educate those gifts at a professional level.

He finishes by saying that ”there is a very particular way of feeling the music and, if you don’t feel it that way, you can’t play it correctly. Time, tuning and melody are essential for anyone who wants to be a professional musician.

Cuban talent despite the circumstances

According to one of the descriptions provided by René’s website, the artist is one of the figures who demonstrates the virtuosity of Cuban-born musicians. Of course, considering that the island does not live the same normality as most countries in the world.

About this, René said that ”clothes don’t make man. The most important thing to a talented person with an instrument is to focus on what he or she has to do and not look at anything around. There may be vicissitudes and shortages, but if you are focused on something you love, you have to find a way to improve and develop yourself in spite of everything”.

In his case, the musician tells us that he had friends with travel opportunities who brought the most recent findings made in music and he was always interested in knowing these things to apply them to his own technique.

Juan Antón ”El Blanco” from La Clave Del Blanco

Everything started in Peru for Juan

There is always a pool of new talents to be known and analyzed, since our Latin countries are the cradle of great artists of all kinds, especially in the area of music. Today it was the turn of the talented Peruvian Juan Antón.

We have taken the audacity to contact the leader of the orchestra La Clave Del Blanco, Juan Antón, to know the most important details of his professional life and his current group. We are very pleased to present to our readers the most important details of this pleasant and enlightening conversation, which lasted for almost half an hour.

Peruvian singer Juan Antón, Leader of La Clave Del Blanco

First contacts with music

Juan Antón was born in Peru, specifically in El Callao, a port city near Lima which is well known to all salsa lovers. Like most of the salseros who have passed through International Salsa Magazine, Juan started getting interested in music since he was a child and enjoyed La Sonora Matancera and, later on, the salsa music that came from New York.

However, although he was always a lover of the aforementioned musical genre, his career began with Peruvian Creole music, which is composed of waltzes, jarana, black music, among other variants.

When he leaned towards this kind of music, he sang with guitar, cajón and bass at parties in a bohemian way. He had some proposals to work with Creole music in a more professional way, but he accepted due to the pile of responsibilities he had with his work and studies. He was doing well at the time, but admits that he regrets that decision today because it would have been a good start.

United States

While it is true that his first steps in the world of music were taken in Peru, it was in the United States that he finally began to be part of more professional groups.

Juan’s first opportunity in that respect came when he was at a Peruvian party where his compadre was given a Creole music ensemble. Knowing those present that he sang, they invited him to accompany the ensemble and perform with them, which Juan accepted and did.

The musicians of the group liked his work so much that they asked him for his number and later called him to sing with them. At that time, he met Jorge Del Castillo, a well-known guitarist from the San Francisco Bay Area, who invited him to join a group he was forming and gave him a CD, asking him to learn those songs. The group would be called Kokos Band.

When Juan was listening to the CD in his car, he found out that it was salsa and not Creole music. When he went to tell Jorge that he gave me the wrong CD, he said it was the correct one and the future group would be singing salsa.

Since Creole music and salsa are very different, Juan had to learn a number of details such as the clave, the signals to the musicians, the way of singing, among other things.

Some time later, the story repeated itself. The conguero of Kokos Band proposed him to join the orchestra he was creating, with which he became much more successful and went to more renowned events such as the inauguration of a museum for Puerto Rican and Cuban baseball players. Its name was Orquesta Liberazión.

Being Peruvian, Juan was really proud that attendees mostly from Puerto Rico and Cuba complimented his work the way they did. Considering that both countries have been the cradles of the main exponents of salsa, the congratulations from this group were very important to him.

The third and last orchestra he played with was Saboriche. His time with this group made him realize that he had what it took to become independent and create his own project.

Juan Antón at The Cigar Bar — Juan Antón and La Clave del Blanco performing at The Cigar Bar & Grill

La Clave Del Blanco

One of Juan’s greatest inspirations to devote himself to music was La Clave Del Callao, since the music of this band influenced him and he liked it very much. In addition to that, the name by which many began to know Juan in the San Francisco Bay Area was ”El Blanco”.

Both of these things led him to name his own orchestra ”La Clave Del Blanco”.

Salsa Con Caché

In addition to his facet as a singer, Juan also had a radio show at La Grande 1010 AM and its name was ”Salsa Con Caché”, which was on the air for only one year. Its cancellation was due precisely to the professional commitments the artist had with his music.

He decided to call ”Salsa Con Caché” to this space because ”caché” in many countries means ”elegant” and ”refined”. This is precisely the salsa style he has always liked.

One of the things that set this program apart from others of their kind in the San Francisco Bay Area is that Juan always talked about the history of the artists and the orchestras playing on the air so that listeners would know all this information. Other programs only played background music and did not add more elements to the programming.

Juan was so successful that he received hundreds of phone calls daily and was even appeared in the now defunct San Francisco Chronicles as one of the best salsa shows at the time.

This success was due to the enormous constancy and important information the announcer had. Although Juan does not regard himself as a scholar in the matter, he assures us that he had what it took to keep listeners hooked to his knowledge. He even commented that he had a private collection of more than 600 original CDs in all languages, which he bought gradually.

This extensive music collection helped him a lot to offer a varied repertoire during the time when ”Salsa Con Caché” was on the air.

Juan Antón as an announcer — Juan Antón was also an announcer and his show was called ”Salsa Con Caché”

Recruiting talent for La Clave del Blanco

During his journey through the orchestras where he played, Juan got to know a lot of musicians, especially during his time with Orquesta Liberazión. He became friends with many of them and, when he started forming his own orchestra, he asked them to be part of it.

Since he managed to establish his group, the singer has always made sure to deliver what he promises. This means that, if he makes an offer for the work done, he always honors the full amount. For Juan, ”The most important thing in this business is the given word”, so you always have to deliver what you promise at the beginning.

With respect to the above, Juan has lived this same situation with orchestras he has worked with, so he does not want to have debts with the musicians he hires. This is how he has gained their trust and, whenever he needs them, they are there for him.

Yani Borrell ”El Elegante de La Salsa”

How Yani became the artist he is now

We were fortunate to speak with the Cuban singer based in Canada, Yani Borrell, who has been kind enough to spare us a few minutes of his busy schedule to reveal unpublished details of his beginnings in music, departure from Cuba, arrival in Canada, current projects, among other things.

Then these were the most important issues that came up in the conversation we had with the artist for a little over half an hour.

Cuban singer Yani — This is Yani Borrell, a famous Cuban singer based in Canada

Grupo Constitución

Yani joined Grupo Constitución being just a 17-year-old. In his native city of Camagüey, there was a small square where concerts were held and Grupo Constitución used to rehearse there. One day, the young man was going through the place and was struck by what the musicians were doing at that moment.

Suddenly, the musical director asked the vocalist to make a little more complex melody, but failed. However, Yani perceived the sound and reproduced it with his lips loudly. That got the music director’s attention so much that he asked the young man to come over and show the singer what he had done.

When he repeated it, the musical director of the group was so fascinated that he asked her to join them. This is how Yani began to study music to a more professional level and to hold the necessary auditions to be able to belong to an orchestra in Cuba (this was a mandatory requirement in the country to belong to a musical group).

After attracting the attention of other groups due to his talent, Yani was contacted by a more renowned orchestra, Yani decided to leave Grupo Constitución and go with his new companions to seize this new opportunity that life had to offer.

Making music in Cuba

We know that the political and economic situation in Cuba has been complicated for some decades, so we wanted to know how Yani lived these years in his native country while devoting himself to music.

That’s when he started telling us that he had to live through the terrible Special Period, one of the worst crises experienced by the island, so logically he did not have the necessary resources to devote himself fully to his passion and put aside any other job at that time.

Yani on stage — Yani Borrell performing on stage

This is because Yani thought that being in a mildly famous orchestra would bring him the benefits he was looking for, but unfortunately, it was not so. Rather, he was really struck with the difficult reality that sometimes performances and concerts were paid several months later.

Yani and many of his colleagues had to borrow in order to survive and wait for the pay day to settle the debts with those same people. This situation persisted for quite some time until he could work for an orchestra established for tourism, with which payments were a little more regular.

However, she had to make a living doing other activities outside the world of the arts. In his case, Yani was self-employed and even had a small mobile coffee shop where he sold sandwiches. At the same time, he studied music and worked with some orchestras, since it was impossible to live only from music.

The first level orchestras that toured internationally always pursued better financial compensation for their musicians, but salaries were still insufficient to alleviate the crisis experienced in Cuba.

Moving to Canada, Toronto

The process to live Cuba and move to Canada was extremely hard. Yani had already toured the North American country for some time, in fact, he was in about 25 Canadian cities during his tours, so he already knew the territory quite well.

Before the second tour he would do in that country with his orchestra of the day, the artist was very clear that he was going to ”defect from Cuba” (that is how the act of leaving the country at the first opportunity is called in Cuba).

While it is true that his standard of living had improved considerably with this international orchestra, this did not offer the stability he wanted, so he resigned from the group, decided to stay and live permanently in Canada and start a new life.

Today, he is completely satisfied with the results of his decisions and knows very well that he has done the right things for his career and his life in general.

Yani on radio — Yani Borrell during a radio interview

Adaptation to the Toronto music scene

One of the hardest decisions was already made, but there were still some challenges to overcome. He had to face language and cultural barriers in order to stand ut and make a place in the city’s Latin music scene.

At the same time, he worked in factories and even start his own business. He says there were times when he did not even sleep because he played with several local orchestras at the same time, so dividing his time between each of them was a titanic task. However, all the effort paid off.

After being with one of the most renowned orchestras in the area, Yani realized it was time to create his own project, which he called Yani Borrell & The Clave Kings.

After all this, he began to be prompted by a group of people who wanted to help him and pushed him to keep growing, thanks to which he released his first solo album in 2013.

C.W. Entertainment

The artist management company C.W. Entertainment was very important in Yoni’s growth as an artist, because at one point it joined forces with the artist and boosted his career to such an extent that this team made him one of the most important salsa artists of the time in Canada. So much was the support that it was this label that filmed his first two music videos.

Although he no longer works with that company for a year and a half, Yani assures that he still has an excellent relationship with its team and thanks these people for everything they have done for him.

Today, the Cuban already has his own record label and is entirely independent in this aspect.

Yani Borrell receiving recognition at the Caribbean Music and Entertainment Awards

El Elegante de La Salsa (The Elegance of Salsa)

One of the names by which Yani Borrell has been known throughout his career is ”El Elegante de La Salsa” due to his style when singing in this genre and the use of formal wear in concerts.

Regarding the story of how the nickname came about, it was precisely a social communicator who was very well liked in the city of Toronto, constantly interviewed the Cuban singer and started refering to him as ”the heartthrob”.

However, this journalist was the host of the concert in which Yani released his album and referred to him as ”El Galán de La Salsa” (The Salsa Heartthrob) at the moment of presenting him to the public.

From there, the public started refering to him as ”el galán” and ”el elegante”, which led one of his managers to tell him to start calling himself ”El Elegante de La Salsa”.

Future performances

Recently the nominees for the Latino de Oro Music Award have been announced, among which Yoni Borrell appears as one of the nominees for the ”Impact Singer with International Projection” category.

This was news that Yoni received with great pleasure due to so many years of effort to lift his artistic career. This and each one of the recognitions that the artist has received throughout his career has made him feel very proud and sure that he is on the right path.

He also revealed for the first time that he will be one of the artists invited to perform on stage that day to animate the event in the city of León, Spain.

To end the conversation, Yoni finished giving a message to Cuban musicians in which he said that they should always focus on discipline, which he defined as ”the mother of perfection”. He also invited these same young people not to despair and to be constant, since this career is an endurance race, not a marathon.