Chucho, Gonzalo & the (brief) story of Cuban music

I was invited to speak last night at a reception prior to last night's Symphony Center concert Chucho Valdés and Gonzalo Rubalcaba: Trance. It came my way because of the writing I do for Agúzate, Chicago's online magazine of Afro Latin Music and Culture.

I thought, because of a misunderstanding on my part, that I would be speaking from a lectern, so I prepared a presentation that would last 10-15 minutes and be partially devoted to the history of Cuban music, leading to Chucho and Gonzalo's place in that ongoing story. What happened instead is that I was the featured panelist in a one-on-one discussion moderated by Karla Leal, a reporter with Telemundo's Chicago outlet. That turned out to be a far superior experience for me and, I believe, the audience, because I was able to respond to the questions from a place of knowledge that went deeper than what I covered in my notes, yet do it in a more casual, engaging way. At the same time, lots of the more academic stuff got left out. Ah, well. At least I was prepared.

I've moderated plenty of discussions in my day, but here the roles were reversed, and I was the "expert". I generally loathe being considered an expert at anything, because for me the joy comes from something that I don't yet know but might discover tomorrow. I recently did some work under my marketing persona of Home Base Arts for Puerto Rican drummer Henry Cole, and as he told me about his creative process and the history and heritage that feed it, I was blown away as the cultural connections between past, present and possibly future were revealed.

Nonetheless, here I was in the role of expert, with people depending on me for insight on the music they were about to hear. And I gotta admit, having several people come up to me afterward to thank me or even solicit my opinion (What do I think about Rubén Gonzales?) was a blast.

I think it is my sociology training that has led to my curiosity (or is it the other way around?). When I hear music that I like, I tend to become a bit obsessed and need to immediately start looking into what it is and where it came from and what forces shaped it. I told as much to someone after the presentation last night, that I first heard Latin music in high school in the form of Santana, then heard my first pure salsa record a short time after graduating from college (El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico) and I've been finding out everything I can about Afro Latin music ever since.

This blog, too, comes out of my sociology training. The concept of community and the cultural unfolding and transformation that results from migration are my two overarching themes, but I'm pretty sure I came to that from music, not the other way around.

Anyway... I went through the process of writing 1,100+ words on Cuba and Chucho and Gonzalo, and I even learned a thing or two while doing that. If you're still reading, then maybe I've got you for the next 1,100 words, too.

Enjoy.


Tonight you will hear two Cuban piano masters engaging in a dialog. The music that they will be playing emerges out of a tradition that goes back several centuries or more, and it contains both folkloric and classical elements. In the end, though, it is uniquely Cuban.

To trace the roots of the music that you will hear tonight, you have to go back nearly 3000 years, to when the Phoenicians, a Semitic people with origins in the Middle East, established a trading post in what would become the bustling port city of Cadiz on Spain’s southwest coast. Before Christopher Columbus set off on his expedition in 1492, the Iberian Peninsula was a collection of smaller kingdoms with distinct traditions, languages and customs. The southern area of Andalucia was ruled by the Moors, who were Muslims from North Africa and the Middle East. When you hear flamenco music, you are hearing a direct link to Arabic melodies and rhythms. Meanwhile, the northern and central areas were more connected to the rest of Europe, and their customs and culture followed suit.

By the time the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria departed that same port of Cadiz, the kingdoms of Aragon and Castile were united and these two cultures were blended. Together, this new superpower exerted greater control over the rest of Iberia. Over the next century and a half, the “New World” colonies were established, bringing untold wealth back to Europe in the form of such newly discovered, and instantly fashionable, products like coffee, chocolate, tobacco and spices. The labor engine that facilitated that wealth was the Atlantic slave trade, which brought millions of Africans to the Americas. The Caribbean port through which much of this movement of people and goods passed through was Havana, Cuba. When you listen to Cuban music, then, you are listening to a mixture of European structure, Middle Eastern harmonics and African rhythms.

A distinct Cuban style of music, and especially piano playing, emerged out of European classical music in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In Cuba, the French contradanse, or ‘country dance’, evolved into the contradanza as syncopations of African origin were blended into it. This musical style further evolved into the danzón by the late 19th century. Perhaps the most famous composer and pianist of this classical style is the orchestra leader Ernesto Lecuona, who wrote the classic tune Siboney, among many others. Smaller danzón ensembles like Orquesta Aragon began including bongos and other drums, blending them with violins and flutes to create a sound known as charanga.

By the 1930s, North American jazz was flavoring the stew along with a stronger emphasis on what were now distinctly Afro-Cuban rhythms, and you hear the beginnings of the mambo and the cha-cha. The Afro-Cuban conga and bongo drums, whose rhythms were up to this point merely hinted at, were now front and center, along with horn arrangements borrowed from jazz. There were a handful of innovators who led the way here. Bassist Cachao and pianist Bebo Valdés were primary among them. 

When the descarga scene, marked by lengthy improvisational jam sessions, emerged in the 1950s, Bebo and Cachao were often leading the sessions. At the same time, African-American jazz musicians like Dizzy Gillespie were taking note of what was going on and started experimenting with Cuban rhythms, giving rise to what would be known as Latin jazz. When you hear a salsa or Latin jazz band really stretch out and cook, you are hearing a descendant of those descargas.

Bebo Valdés’ son Chucho emerged in the 1970s as a founding member of the groundbreaking group Irakere, arguably one of the best and most influential bands to emerge from post-revolution Cuba. The ensemble, which also included trumpeter Arturo Sandoval and saxophonist Paquito D’Rivera, might very well be called Afro-Futurist today in the way that they combined deeply spiritual Afro-Cuban rhythms to forward thinking jazz and electric rock band energy. When I say “deeply spiritual”, I’m referring to the role of the drum itself, because before it appeared in popular music, its function was strictly a sacred one in the rites of the Afro-Cuban santaría religion that derived from the spiritual concepts and practices of the West African Yoruba people.

Chucho Valdés kept Irakere going after Sandoval and D’Rivera left Cuba for the United States, but he also grew as a solo artist and leader of several jazz ensembles, moving over to acoustic piano as his main instrument.

Meanwhile, another pianist from a musical family, Gonzalo Rubalcaba, was growing up listening to Valdés and Irakere. In the 1980s, he formed Grupo Proyecto, one of several young bands inspired by the pioneering Irakere. By the end of the decade, Rubalcaba also turned to acoustic piano and was soon part of a trio that included American jazz giants Charlie Haden and Paul Motian, and made his international debut in 1991 with the album Discovery: Live in Montreaux. That album was put out in the U.S. by the legendary jazz label Blue Note, who also released Chucho Valdés’ U.S. debut Solo Piano the same year. 

Both pianists went on to stellar jazz careers that nonetheless have the heartbeat of Cuba at their center, regardless of whether they are playing solo, small ensemble or big band dates. Both have proved adept at the two-piano format. Over the last three-plus decades, Chucho Valdés has released over 30 albums, including his 2015 “Tribute to Irakere” with his group the Afro-Cuban Jazz Messengers, which he performed live here at Symphony Center. Rubalcaba has been similarly prolific, releasing nearly 30 albums since then, and he too, has recently been at Symphony Center, performing solo in 2012.

Because of the nature of tonight’s concert, I need to make special mention of Chucho’s 1998 duet album with his father Bebo Valdés. Entitled Juntos para Siempre, the album is a gorgeous masterpiece that stands as a testament to what can happen when you get two Cuban pianists in a room together.

So that’s what you’ll be hearing tonight: Thousands of years of musical history distilled through a very special place called Cuba that will manifest itself as a musical conversation between friends who are perhaps the most important pianists to emerge from Cuba in the modern era. They began this collaboration a few years ago and call it Trance because it explores the profound spiritual connection that remains at the heart of Cuban music. You won’t hear any drums tonight, but you will feel them.

Instead, you’ll hear two musicians with a historic relationship to the Cuban piano tradition engaged in open-ended, respectful conversation. You’ll hear two friends whose mutual admiration for each other and the tradition they represent weave everything together until ultimately they almost speak as one.

And lest you think this will be some laid back recital, be assured that there will also be sonic fireworks from these master musicians. Their hearts, after all, beat to the rhythm of Cuba.

Chucho & Gonzalo: Masters at Work, Symphony Center, 2/23/18