Search - Latin Jazz Crew :: Authenticity

New perspective in Latin Jazz

08/18/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The first album of the Miami based Latin Jazz Crew is a refreshing exploration into a genre of music that for the past three or for years has been growing in audience. Refreshing because the music itself has sounded repetitive and often times lakluster. The Latin Jazz Crew is led by veteran bass player Eddie "Gua Gua" Rivera who was a founding member of Puerto Rico's Batacumbele whos members included Giovanni Hidalgo, Papo Vasquez, Ignacio Berroa, and other leaders in the movement today. The Crew's approach is complex and challenging; how to make a latin jazz quintet sound latin yet not overstate the continous polyrithmic approach of the "guajeo and tumbao. " This becomes an extremely difficult task in order to implement the clave and the laying down of the typical percussion paterns which is common to all latin music. The result is a recording in which only the very fine tuned latin enthusiast can appreciate. Most of my friends are not to appreciative of the album, but when I show this album to other veteran latin musicians they are overwhelmed. The typical "how did they do that" or "rewind that part" are always present. The album expplores a variety of styles but they are not dominated by one particular track. Instead, the songs move in and out of diferent styles and time signatures making the chord and harmonic structures more complex. Fortunately, the group gels extremely well and does not overwhelm the listener. Other recordings sometimes feel like the musicians are trying to hard. The crew takles these challenges in subtle manner while still maintaining an extreme latin feel that is fast paced and mesmorizing. The piano solos (Jorge Sosa) are are all over the scale and energetic. The drum phrasing is unique and has a distinct feel by not sticking to the typical cuban patterns but experimenting with southamerican rythms and other carribean expressions. Again, avoiding the repetitive establishment. The conga patterns by Gloria Estefan's Edwin Bonilla are anything but your typical tumbao and his timbal chops are some of the best anywhere. Finally the sax man Fernando Diez, grandson of Cubas Great Barbarito Diez gives the band it's signature by establishing authentic and complex phrasing. The flaw to this album is in the mixing. I don,t know if the idea was to be almost easy listening but the percussion doesn't come as clean as I would have liked and maybe some notes to the laymen about some of the different rythms would have been nice. Again this is not for the casual latin fan. The tracks are are at the spectrum where latin music is at the pinacle of energy and creativity. A must for students of the genre and for those who are tired of what I call Salsa jazz which is just hardcore salsa tumbaos whith powerfull solos and a common a repetitive modal state that has been repeted all over the world. I think this is where latin jazz must go for musicians to gain out of genre respect and not be catagorized as just a "Latin Musician""