Results for "Ray Barretto"

Ray Barretto

Barretto was born on 29 April 1929, in the Brooklyn borough of New York City, of Puerto Rican parents. Noted for his many years as a prominent Latin bandleader, his music career actually began as a studio performer on the conga for jazz recording sessions. He was raised in the Latin ghettos of East Harlem and the Bronx, in an environment filled with music of Puerto Rico but with a love for the swing bands of Ellington, Basie and Goodman. He escaped the ghetto by joining the United States Army when he was 17 years old, but he did not escape the music. Influenced by a record of Dizzy Gillespie, “Manteca”, with conguero Chano Pozo

Sir Stevie: Jammin' on Stevie Wonder - Part 1

By LUDOVICO GRANVASSU

Stevie Wonder has more entries in the Real Book than any other pop musician, The Beatles included. It is not surprising therefore that his Songbook has been mined by hundreds of jazz musicians, including the likes of Sonny Rollins, Dizzy Gillespie, Ella Fitzgerald, Dexter Gordon or Herbie Hancock. To mark the 70th birthday of ...

Samuel Torres: The Interfuse of Percussion and Orchestration

By JIM WORSLEY

Samuel Torres is a percussionist extraordinaire. Samuel Torres is an exceptional composer. Samuel Torres is an astute arranger. Samuel Torres has vast skills as an orchestrator. All of those statements are valid responses to the question, who is Samuel Torres? The Colombian born artist, who now makes his home in New York City, has, as they ...

Jonathan Goldman: Bump and Let It Slide

By CHRIS M. SLAWECKI

On Saturday February 29, Spanglish Fly will celebrate completing their tenth full year as America's leading producer and exporter of the wicked hot musical sauce known as Latin boogaloo with a special anniversary performance hosted by the legendary Brooklyn hotspot Barbes. The quintessential musical melting pot Spanglish Fly features musicians with roots in Puerto ...

Samuel Torres: Alegria

By DAN BILAWSKY

After delivering a politically-pointed statement in the form of Forced Displacement (Zoho Music, 2015), Colombian percussionist Samuel Torres most certainly could've doubled-down in that direction. There's no shortage of political turmoil across the globe these days, so that move would've been completely understandable. But, as Torres clearly understands, there's something to be said for the power ...

The Cry of Jay Rodriguez

By MICHAEL BLAKE

On an unseasonably warm February evening I set out from Brooklyn to catch the multi-instrumentalist Jay Rodriguez's band at Le Poisson Rouge. While walking from the West 4th Street subway station to the venue on Bleecker Street I recalled taking this exact route over 30 years ago to play a jam session in the ...

Gene Ammons: Boss Tenor

By MATTHEW AQUILINE

Tenor saxophonist Gene Ammons' tone can be best described using the qualities of an ideally brewed cup of joe: rounded, bold, smooth, and exhilarating after first taste. Widely regarded as an original founder of the “Chicago school of tenor sax," Ammons' nonchalant, yet indelible sound--echoing the soft, breathy tone of Lester Young--drove him to ...