![]() ![]() ![]() Call it crawfish salsa, as the Afro-Cuban beats simmered well with Crescent City spice. Sanchez brings up vocalist and harmonica player Dale Spaulding and Ledesi, a gifted San Francisco-area singer, to do Joe Liggin’s “Back to New Orleans.” The song’s cool, syncopated, Meters-style funk gets some folks dancing in the aisles like its Mardi Gras. His sound is a mix of Jazz Crusaders-style harmonies, soulful melodic lines and hip Afro-Cuban beats. Sanchez steps up to the microphone to sing and improvise verses with a gritty R&B-inflected voice. During Sanchez’s solo his hands glide across the skins with slaps, thuds and a determined attack the crowd applauds and whoops it up like he’s the lead guitarist for a rock band.Īgile on stage singing, dancing and hitting the skins with bruising strength, Sanchez is no longer confined to sitting behind the drums and letting Jose “Papo” Rodriguez, his bongo man, do conga duties. It’s a bigger task and a more rewarding and artistic one, and Poncho is great at it.”Īfter Sanchez and his crew take the stage, Poncho’s drums out in front of the band, the band establishes an upbeat tone quickly with “Sambia,” the old Machito mambo-jazz piece. It goes into making music, keeping a group together and bringing people together and really making them happy with it. (The pianist also appears on two cuts on Latin Spirits.) “That goes beyond playing the drums. “Poncho’s not only a great percussionist but also making his mark as a great bandleader,” says Chick Corea before sitting in with Sanchez. With a longshoreman’s broad shoulders, a bushy salt and pepper beard, his trademark black salsero Kangol cap and huge callused hands, the one-time aluminum foundry worker turns 50 this year and he’s aging gracefully into one of the premier conga drummers in jazz. Tonight Sanchez and his guys are celebrating 21 years as a band and the release of their 21st album, Latin Spirits, on Concord Picante. Through the label’s thick and thin times, Sanchez has hung in there and been one of Concord’s longest-lasting and best-selling artists. Now owned by ACT III Communications, headed by Hal Gibbons and Norman Lear, the label started by former car dealer Carl Jefferson has taken its lumps but now thrives as one of independent jazz’s strongest record companies. With Karrin Allyson, Curtis Stigers, Chick Corea Trio and Poncho Sanchez Latin Jazz Band, the place is filled with a roster of stars for this unproclaimed salute to the resiliency of Concord Records, the resident independent label that a few years ago found itself in Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings. Diablo in the San Francisco suburb of Concord, Calif. Their music is so laden with danceable rhythms and grooves that their music is just pure fun to hear, being one of the best bands in Afo-Cuban jazz.It’s a semi-cool Northern California evening in late July on opening night of the Fujitsu-Concord Jazz Festival, a musical celebration under the stars at Chronicle Pavilion, the mega-amphitheatre at the foot of Mt. Poncho Sanchez and his band are incredible live performers and thoroughly entertaining to watch and listen to. And then "Watermelon" came in to finish with a really heavy, slow funk that brought many a hip into gyration. Highlight was "Conmigo" with its frantically melodic flute solo alongside the fast-paced bossa-nova swing. "El Shing-A-Ling" was a driving samba rhythm that was infectious, finding my feet uncontrollably moving in a poorly attempted salsa shuffle. He began with "One Mint Julep," providing his large band complete with several horns and percussionists to settle into the latin funk and get the crowd moving. His talents haven't gone unnoticed, with his ensemble being awarded with a Grammy for "Best Latin Jazz Album" for "Latin Soul." His performance at Montreux jazz festival was something immensely special, laying down some delectable latin grooves that are desperate for a plethora of tail feathers to be shaken wildly in appreciation of his eclectic tunes. Poncho Sanchez is one of the most rhythmically exciting and innovative artists in the modern world, with his music being highly influential amongst conga players and percussionists in the Afro-Cuban jazz scene.
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