Chucho Valdés brings his Royal Quartet to Tampa on September 26 for his 85th-birthday tour

Foto: Wikimedia Commons / Jacek Proszyk (CC BY-SA 4.0)

September 23, 2026

Cuban pianist Chucho Valdés will bring his Royal Quartet to Ferguson Hall at the Straz Center for the Performing Arts in Tampa on Saturday, September 26, 2026, at 7:00 p.m., as part of a tour marking his 85th birthday on October 9 and 70 years in music. The date is listed by the venue and was detailed in a CENTRO Tampa / Tampa Bay Beacons interview; the set is expected to run about 90 minutes of instrumental music.

The current lineup features Valdés on piano, José Armando Gola on bass, Horacio “El Negro” Hernández on drums and Roberto Jr. Vizcaíno Torre on percussion. Born October 9, 1941, and famed as the founder of Irakere, Valdés said the program will spotlight new Afro-Cuban jazz material beyond the Grammy-winning album Cuba a un Millón.

A 15-time Grammy winner who lives in Fort Lauderdale, Valdés pointed to family and audience ties in Tampa and invited Cuban and Hispanic fans in the bay area to “get ready to have a great time.” Tickets are available through the Straz Center’s official site.

Fuente: CENTRO Tampa / Tampa Bay Beacons; Straz Center; JamBase

Dionisio Jesús Valdés Rodríguez

Pianist, Musician, Composer, Director, Music, Society

Pianist, organist, composer and instrumentalist, Chucho Valdés is considered one of the best pianists in the world and certainly the most important jazz figure currently in Cuba. Chucho was born in Alquízar, current province of Mayabeque. From childhood he began playing piano guided by his father, also pianist, Bebo Valdés, and at age 14 he began his professional activity in the orchestra Sabor de Cuba, directed by his father.