At Chucho's 80s, the first cut from the album Los herederos premieres: a tribute to Chucho Valdés and Irakere

October 10, 2021

No one in this land, who breathes the air of this land, feels estranged from what Dionisio de Jesús Valdés, Chucho, represents in Cuban musical culture. It may be that for now he takes his distance, does not understand the keys to the reality of his people here and now, but nothing, and no one will deny the scepter that belongs to the vanguard of the vanguard of Cuban jazz inside and outside the island, nor will they fail to celebrate the eight decades of life of the pianist and composer.

The facts speak for themselves. The announcement in the days when with a small instrumental format, of what were called combos, he began to reveal his style. The composition of Mambo Influenciado (1964), a work that revolutionized Cuban pianistics in the jazz orbit. The call to integrate the Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna. The international leap at the Jazz Jamboree in Poland, the recording of Jazz batá in 1972 (the saga, Jazz batá 2, in 2018 was quite an event), the creation of Irakere in 1973, the Grammy that broke the ice in 1979, the National Prize for Music, the Orden Félix Varela, the reign at Cubadisco, the honorary doctorates from the Universidad de las Artes de La Habana and from the renowned Berklee College in Boston. Works that are worth their weight: Misa negra, Juana 1600, Neurosis, Cien años de juventud, Yamsá, New Orleans, Bacalao con pan, Obatalá and so many more.

Early on, Armando Romeu, a pioneer of jazz in Cuba, said of him: "When he plays, he dazzles, but when we listen to him more than once, he opens unknown worlds to us that we did not imagine on the piano before the miracle of his interpretations happens." Leonardo Acosta, perhaps the most penetrating and complete of the Cubans who have written about the genre, affirmed: "Chucho fulfills the three things that Horace Silver demands of jazz: strength, emotion and intellect."

In Cuba, Chucho's 80th birthday was greeted this Saturday with the premiere of the first track of an album Los herederos: homenaje a Chucho Valdés e Irakere, a production by Egrem in charge of Élsida González Portal, who had the idea of integrating into one body the current saga of the pianist and the band, which will deserve later, when it circulates in its entirety, an evaluation.

The novelty will be available on the Cuban digital platform Sandunga and consists of the happy marriage of bolero and jazz, of the work titled Una melodía a Picho, by César Alejandro López, with solos by pianist Harold López-Nussa and trumpeter Julito Padrón and the contributions of drummer Enrique Plá and bassist Carlos del Puerto, who were among the Irakere of the early days and others who came later such as saxophonist Germán Velasco and flutist Orlando Valle, Maraca.

For his part, Chucho is preparing to land this month in California venues where he will join saxophonist Joe Lovano, while preparing in Barcelona the world premiere, in November, of a major work for big band, Afro-Cuban percussion and voices, titled La creación, inspired by Olodumare, a mythical figure of the Yoruba pantheon.

Una melodía a Picho is a preview of the album "Los herederos. Homenaje a Chucho Valdés e Irakere" where Cuban musicians such as Issac Delgado, Alain Pérez, Cimafunk and others highlight the musical work of Valdés that has transcended by fusing jazz with rock, classical genres and Afro-Cuban rhythms.

The Empresa de Grabaciones y Ediciones Musicales (Egrem) noted in a press release that the production coincides with Valdés' 80th birthday, "one of the greatest artists in the history of Cuban music of all time."

Dionisio Jesús Valdés Rodríguez was born in 1941 in Quivicán, in the same place and day as his father Bebo Valdés (1918-2018), another of the great jazz pianists.

Chucho has won 9 Grammys and in 2018 received the Musical Excellence Award given by the Latin Academy of Recording, based in the United States.

The pianist, composer, arranger and founder of the legendary group Irakere remains active and is an essential reference for Cuban music.

Cuban journalist Michel Hernández has written about Chucho and Irakere on this platform: "He never stopped dignifying the legacy of Irakere. That is why he continues to celebrate tributes to his mother band throughout the world, with a group formed by new generations of musicians who understand well the meaning of being there, sharing the stage with the pianist and maintaining the languages inherited from the master and from the rest of the musicians of the caliber of the band-icon."