The Revisiting series features albums from the past that played a significant role in Latin Jazz history. The purpose of this series is to introduce new Latin Jazz listeners to important albums and look back at these albums in historical perspective. Each entry will jump to a different point in Latin Jazz history - this week we move into 1975.

After an artist reaches a superior level of artistic achievement and a high level of commercial success, they face several different directions for their career’s future. Once a musician displays outstanding technical skill on their instrument, a number of followers copy their abilities, and often best them. The originators are usually remembered, but they share, or even loose the spotlight to upcoming players. When an artist pushes a genre into a new state of being, more musicians follow that trend and it continues to evolve. While history respects the innovator, the public always follows the current developments. While musicians feel joy through their accomplishments in the present, they must realize that they are part of a larger development. Ground breaking musicians can look at their musicianship and remain in their past innovations, or they can follow the new developments and continue to evolve as musicians.

By the mid-1970s, Dizzy Gillespie, Machito, and Chico O’Farrill had all enjoyed artistic and commercial success and they were well respected in their fields; still the future remained unsure. Gillespie created the bebop language, and he stood as a living spokesperson for the music. Rock had long stolen the public though, and Gillespie’s prodigious musicality no longer thrilled the masses. Machito led his band through the mambo craze and beyond, always staying on the cutting edge with a close relationship to jazz. In the late 1960s, Salsa became the primarily Latin dance craze, and although Machito remained an important figure, new artist like Ray Barretto and Charlie Palmieri grew into contemporary stars. O’Farrill remained a highly demanded writer from his early days in New York up to the 1970s, working in a variety of genres. With the declining popularity of jazz in the 1970s though, he didn’t get ample opportunities to write for big bands or large Latin ensembles. All three musicians worked together in the 1950s, and a recording that fondly remembered their past would have been received warmly; yet their 1975 collaboration Afro-Cuban Jazz Moods found the masters exploring new territory, attempting to push their artistry forward.

The majority of the album centers around an extended Latin Jazz trumpet concerto entitled “Oro, Incienseo, Y Mirra.” O’Farrill’s arrangement ingeniously weaves bold themes through a variety of Afro-Cuban rhythmic styles, stopping along the way for briefs dips into free jazz. The Machito band’s precise articulation and pure tone drives the piece while Gillespie acts as an improvisatory centerpiece, placing his patented bebop phrases over the band. Synthesizers, electric bass, and occasional backbeats provide a modern edge to the music, but never overwhelm the piece’s jazz and Cuban roots. Harmonically, the piece moves between traditional Cuban song, bebop complexity, and contemporary dissonance; O’Farrill stitches each approach together smoothly, emphasizing their commonality. Sometimes sudden rhythmic feel changes break the piece into smaller sections, all held together by common melodic threads. This piece stands as an artistic statement: a beautiful achievement in writing for O’Farrill, a rich performance from the Machito band, and an improvisatory statement from Gillespie.

The second half of the album presents a Latin Jazz suite of 3 pieces entitled “Three Afro-Cuban Jazz Moods.” The first piece, “Calidoscopico,” captures Gillespie interpreting a more carefully constructed line over an Afro rhythm and the Machito band’s thick texture. The call and response between Gillespie and the Machito band soon segues into a funky Latin fusion feel for Gillespie’s improvisation. O’Farrill drives the piece to an end with a funky cha cha cha that features rich writing for Machito’s aggressive wind section. A lone bari sax winds through a soul-tinged bossa nova on “Pensativo,” leading into interesting writing that mixes Gillespie with different small pieces of the band. O’Farrill’s arrangement soon explodes into a full-blown samba funk for Gillespie’s solo and then transitions into a comparsa rhythm. O’Farrill displays creative trombone writing over a cha cha cha rhythm on “Exuberante,” which Gillespie compliments with a muted solo. The Machito band saxes shape a soulful melody, which moves into a double time Latin rock section. The overall suite showcases an effective concept, executed with a precise touch and creative soloing.

Gillespie, Machito, and O’Farrill proved their relevancy in the modern world through continued explorations on Afro-Cuban Jazz Moods. O’Farrill’s application of larger song forms in the Latin Jazz idiom expressed a highly educated musical voice and set a serious tone for the album. This was not the first time that O’Farrill (or others) wrote Latin Jazz in an extended format, but the scarcity of this approach still left ample room for experimentation. Gillespie’s performance drew strongly from his bebop innovations and early experiments with Cuban rhythms, but his application of this material remains fresh and inspired. He alters musical ideas to fit into the context of the piece, always choosing musicality over flash. Machito’s band breezes through the contemporary material and assertively performs the more traditional sections, maintaining an exciting and professional presence regardless of musical genre. While Machito’s group includes long time members such as his music director Mario Bauzá, it also included younger musicians such as pianist Jorge Dalto; this was a band with a foot in both worlds. Although this recording captured each musician on the later side of their careers, it found them looking forward into new possibilities.

Revisit more classic recordings:
Live At The Montreux Jazz Festival 1980, The Latin Percussion Jazz Ensemble
The Other Road, Ray Barretto
Concepts In Unity, Grupo Folklorico Y Experimental

Click here to have these posts delivered via email. Or, click here to subscribe to the full text RSS feed and never miss another post!

Stumble it!