Search Results for: Tony Vega

His beginnings

Today we have famous Puerto Rican Kharim Santos. Mr. Santos, how have you been feeling? We learned that you were in poor health due to Covid-19.  

First of all, I want to thank you and all your audience for the opportunity to take a few minutes to share with you and be able to talk. In regards of my health, I have always said that the Lord’s way is mysterious and I contracted Covid-19 despite being vaccinated three times, but I am out of that now and in the process of recovering fully. I am forever grateful to the Lord who gives us new opportunities to live.

During my convalescence from Covid-19, we released a new song entitled Lo Van a Entender and it received wide acceptance, so the Lord always blesses in mysterious ways.

You were interested in music from an early age. Could you tell us about the first memory of music?  

I was born in a neighborhood in Puerto Rico called Puerta de Tierra where many important people like Isidro Infante, Joe Quijano, Raphy Leavitt and many other artists have come from. I was born and raised in that neighborhood and my mother, due to his relationship to Daniel Santos “El Anacobero”, received many artists of all musical genres at home like Pete “El Conde” Rodriguez or Ismael Rivera.   

Being such a musical family, music was always very important to me because “Bohemian Nights” were held at my place. A group of friends came to my house and sing “Bohemia”. I was very young when I became really interested in music. I remember Daniel telling my mother that I had a lot of chances in that world.   

The first time I took singing lessons, my teacher was Juan Luis Barry, may he rest in peace. He was the pianist for Silvia Rexach, one of the greatest poets of our country. I also started taking dance lessons with Leonor Contanzo, who is a very professional dancer in Puerto Rico and it was from there that I started to follow the path of music. This has been a complete blessing because this profession has helped me to go to many places both professionally and personally.   

Do you consider that Daniel Santos was some kind of inspiration for starting down this road?  

Oh, yes! What I have always said about Daniel Santos is that the new youth does not know a part of his story, but he was like the “Ricky Martin” or the “Bad Bunny” of the time. He was quite unique because he sang any kind of music and felt very comfortable in any genre. No genre was a problem for him because he sang it very well. He was an icon. I will never be able to be like Daniel Santos and have always wanted to shine with a light of my own taking into account the vision he had of music without disrespecting his career. I made a song called Linda in his honor. I believe that Daniel has been a fundamental part of my career and that of many artists. 

Besides Daniel Santos, what other artists influenced your style and music?  

I will take your question as an opportunity to extend a very special greeting to my friend Cita Rodriguez, daughter of Pete El Conde Rodriguez. Pete was one of those artists who was often on my way home and my mom had a warm friendship with him. I remember his singing, his way of playing “guapacha” (a mix of chachachá and merengue) and that sort of thing. Other artists from the old guard who inspired me were Tito Rodríguez, Rolando Laserie, Santos Colón, Vicentico Valdés and Raphy Leavitt and La Selecta. I bring Raphy Leavitt Y La Selecta up because they used to rehearse a block away from my place.   

When Raphy was alive, he told me that Daniel came close to singing with La Selecta and I did not know a thing about it. These were artists who have marked my life. I believe that the artists of the past have marked my life the most, although there are some modern ones I faithfully follow such as Gilberto Santa Rosa and Tony Vega.   

However, the best artists for me are Cano Estremera and Tito Rojas because they were both great friends I personally met and their singings were very parochial. They were stars, but their fame has never gone to their heads. They always had their feet planted firmly on the ground. 

Is Salsa a thing of the past?

Do you think that these artists and musical genres have gone out of fashion and been replaced by other references?  

I think salsa is a genre that has been perpetuated. I do not think it is going to die or disappear. I hear many colleagues who are always saying that salsa is dead, but I think they are wrong. The concept of salsa is a generational thing, but we forget to connect young people with it. We do not teach them the culture of our music and I give the example of Colombia, which is a country I visited on several occasions with Orquesta La Solución and as a soloist. There salsa is widely heard and people think that urban music is heard more than salsa, but it is not.   

What happens is that Colombians had made sure that new generations keep listening and watching these bastions of music. Many guys who sing urban music have called me to collaborate with me. Farruko uses a clip of Ismael Rivera for his song “El Incomprendido”. Many of these new artists are looking to salsa because they have realized that it is a very enriching genre and it helps them in their work. 

That’s why we have to move on and say thanks to people like you who give us the opportunity to stay relevant and let more people know about us. I also think that we have to be vary careful about our lyrics and what we express. Salsa always distinguished itself for singing about small town stuff happening in our communities and when romantic salsa came, we sang to women with much respect. I think we should be maintained in that area. 

If you listen to the music of the new generations, artists go off on such tangents and disrespect women. I think that women should not be devalued, marked out or treated as sexual objects. We have to teach our young people that we can hear good lyrics and enjoy music at the same time. 

Anything that has always characterized salsa is to touch on social, political, and cultural issues. They also addressed the topic of romance with much respect, but that has recently changed. Do you consider that the quality of the lyrics is not an important matter in the industry?  

I think we have devalued the concept of the genre. I have always said that the artist is like a teacher. If you think of it that way, the artist or singer should be like a teacher who brings the teachings of peace, love, hope and a number of things that you concentrate in your lyrics and music. When you sing positive things, you also generate positive things in people.   

I’m going to be straight with you. I have listened to urban music made by friends of mine and wonder how girls can sing that, knowing that they are being denigrated. It’s as if they cover their ears and listen to that music, but are not interested in what artists are saying. Unfortunately, there are many salsa singers who believe that they should do the same as artists of urban music to get the same results. We have lost values and feelings and I do not understand why we have to sing humiliating things to women.   

We could not only talk about disrespect for women, but also about promoting crime and drugs.  

Yes, it’s like a position of power. It’s about seeing how much power I can express in my songs or videos. In my case, I have focused on stopping my music videos from having anything sexual. A friend of mine who directs videos gave me the idea to make one with a model in a hotel room and I answered that it didn’t work for me. To this day, I am not sure that selling sexuality or violence produces something important in anyone’s life. 

What do you and the artists that are of your opinion think you can do to promote positive things?  

I think we also have to refrain a little bit and leave our biases behind us and our ‘I’ness. That is part of the problem we have. There are many artists who only look after themselves and think they are the best artists of the world, but I think we have to get out of it and I have been doing this. Many of these artists of urban music have called me to make songs and I have said yes, but I have given them my ideas.   

Right now, I am recording the song “La Radio” with Crespo, who sings urban music. We made some modifications to the sing, which talks about this separated couple, but they remember their love when they listen to this song on the radio. That’s a nice thing. We have to educate young people and in so doing, I think that joining them to make collaborations can reform music. We have to help each other. 

Do you believe that you can make culture and shape the society we want through music?  

Of course I do. Music is culture. I have always said that. Music is the basis of how culture and people move. I believe music has been made to express ourselves, but we have to do it properly. In my personal opinion, we cannot use it in an inadequate manner. I have told many colleagues that the fact that a guy who sings urban music makes a denigrating song does not mean that they are going to have the same success. That’s not how things work.   

I believe so much in talent. If you are a talented person, people will listen to you. I had that conversation with Gerardo Rivas, who is extremely talented, but his lyrics are positive because he knows not to denigrate anyone. That is our north. Salsa is culture. I have always said that salsa is not just a genre, but a way of life. 

Something that caught my attention in your biography is that you served in the army and participated in certain renowned armed conflicts. How did you combine your military activities with music?  

I was in the army and served 23 years. I retired in 2011 after serving 23 years. I was in Iran and Afghanistan twice. I was a combat infantryman and I was able to mix the two things because music help me to progress. There are things missing in the biography because it focuses more on my military life, but I am also a university professor.   

There are a lot of things about me that people do not know, but I was able to combine the two things because music helped me overcome adversity when I was in those sites of fighting. I was a nighttime patrol and being in a place where you know you could be killed at any moment for 12 hours is not easy, but music comforted me. During my time in the army, I could also sing with various orchestras and do other activities. It was a great blessing for me.   

His life and career

Ernesto Tito Garcia is a Nicaraguan bandleader and timbalero who has been part of many musical groups that passed from romantic salsa to mambo and many other Latin genres.   

This astonishingly gifted artist has been playing professionally since the year 1971. A few years later, he formed his first orchestra called Ritmo 74, which was in charge of opening up for the biggest names in Latin music from back in the day. Both Ernesto and his fellow musicians were noted for their ages and the musical styles they used at the time. 

He experimented with Latin rock during his youth until he heard salsa for the first time and wanted to devote himself fully to that musical genre. After spending a long time playing romantic music, he decided to experiment with hard salsa and added his own style to the rhythms played by La Orquesta Internacional. 

Our conversation

We are very happy to get him in International Salsa Magazine today ready to go and talk a little about his life and musical career. 

My father signed me up for music lessons. I did not like them very much, but they kept me busy and interested me. Thanks to those lessons I took once a week, my ear opened wide and I learned to read music, which is a very rare thing for a timbalero. In 1969, I was 13 years old and my dad was paying for weekly accordion lessons and when Santana came out in my eighth grade, I heard my first timpani and knew it would be my instrument. That’s when I told my dad not to spend money because I wanted to play the timpani. He was a good man who died in my arms because of the same cancer I have today. 

On Broadway Street, San Francisco was where I began to learn how to play the timpani. My dad helped me buy my first timpani and I found a group that played Latin rock just like Santana, which gave me the opportunity to develop my technique. When I was in San Francisco, I did not hear much of salsa because it was more present in New York City, but my dad bought some records recommended by a friend containing the last of salsa. That was the first time I heard salsa and I was playing Latin rock with the group I already mentioned. When I heard that music, I met a girl who was interested in buying an electric piano that belonged to my girlfriend’s brother who was 15 years old at the time. From there, we formed our first orchestra in 1974, which we called Ritmo 74. When the music outside like Eddie Palmieri or Tito Puente came, people over 40 years old also came, but young people did not like it because the music was very regimented and had many pitoretas (wind musical instrument, also known as clarion). 

About the time Willie Colón came out was when the orchestra started getting big because we were the young people of salsa. I was 16 or 17 years old, while the oldest member was 26 or 27 years old. We had agents who gave us the opportunity to open up for the biggest names in New York like Eddie Palmieri and Willie Colón. At that time, we were the only orchestra of our generation with that kind of playing. We were growing up, but the thing is that I liked education and for whatever reason, I found that I made good grades.   

As our fame grew here in the Bay Area, I had to devote much time to rehearsals, learn new songs, among other things. That’s why my grades started to fall and I was about to graduate from high school. The last two years were the most important ones at school, so I realized I would not be able to do both at the same time. So I decided to quit music and knew the only way in which I could do it was to sell my timpani, so I went to a store and they gave me $60 for them. 

I got my grades up, was admitted by San Francisco State University and the first year was amazing, but I met other Latino students who also played music. They began renting a room right there on campus to rehearse, so I did not have to go somewhere else. It was there that we founded La Orquesta Salsa Caliente and as soon as we got to be known, people liked us. About two or three years later, my grades started to fall again, so I quit music again. I graduated from College and was admitted to the school of optometry in 1985 or 1986. Thanks to that diploma I started working with a very skilled Salvadoran doctor. He was a surgeon and ophthalmologist. When I formed my own orchestra, I had two very simple rules for the members. The first was that when we played, we could not take any kind of drugs or alcohol, while the second was that we had to always wear a suit and a tie, that’s what no other youth orchestra did.   

Do you think that the style of mambo that your orchestra plays is what makes it unique or are there other elements that stand out? 

First of all, when I formed the orchestra, romantic salsa was in vogue just like its exponents included Eddie Santiago, Tony Vega and many more. The problem was that the music was boring because the arrangements were very simple. In 1996 or 1997 was when I heard Tito Puente with his orchestra playing mambo and that is what gave me the idea to do the same with four or five pitoretas. That’s when I lost several musicians and singers because they wanted to sing romantic salsa, but I was tired of that. 

So, we started playing what I called hard salsa, which had mambo arrangements and singers who knew how to perform it. That combination pushed us on a new level. Those who wanted to sing romantic salsa formed their own orchestra. Julio Bravo was one of my favorite artists and I helped him with some musicians. There was also my comadre Denis Corrales, who formed her women’s orchestra. The orchestra looked very good with all the girls, but it was not what dancers were looking for. There is also the case of Venezuelan Eduardo Herrera whose voice was incredible and he also grew up with salsa music, but he did not know how to sing hard salsa. 

Do you think having musicians from so many different countries has to do with the final product you present to the public?  

This did not have a lot of influence on our music. Back then, our orchestra was called Salsa Dulce. When my agent retired, I got stuck with the orchestra. He wanted the orchestra to have my name in its title but did not want it to be too obvious, for example, Los Titanes de La Salsa Con Tito García or El Gran Combo Con Rafael Ithier. Regarding nationalities, the singer was Venezuelan, the bass player was French, the pianist was Peruvian, the conguero was Puerto Rican, the saxophonist was Irish and the trombonist was American as was the trumpet player. It was the reason why my agent suggested me to call it Tito García Y Su Orquesta La Internacional. I liked how it sounded so much that I called the group that.  

What are your future projects? 

I can mention an album dedicated to Tito Puente and am going to record it between San Francisco and Nicaragua. The problem is that his family has the rights to all his music and I do not know if they give me permission to do it. I hope they are not going to charge me a lot for those rights. Of course, we are going to make money with the project, but costs are much more comfortable and negotiable in Nicaragua. That is one of the reasons why I want to do it there.