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http://www.valdeschucho.com/
Chucho Valdés
Bio
Winner of five GRAMMY® and three Latin GRAMMY® Awards, the Cuban pianist, composer and
arranger Chucho Valdés is the most influential figure in modern Afro-Cuban jazz.
His most recent project, Irakere 40, was a celebration of Irakere, a band that, with its bold
fusion of Afro-Cuban ritual music, popular Afro- Cuban music styles, jazz and rock, marked a
before and after in Latin jazz. The extensive 2015 U.S. tour of Chucho Valdés: Irakere 40 was
accompanied by the release of Live at Marciac (Jazz Village /Comanche Music) recorded at the
Jazz in Marciac festival in France earlier that year.
“In our first rehearsal of the old pieces with this band I cried,” says Valdes, who for this project
organized a 10-piece band comprising the members of his quintet, The Afro Cuban Messengers
featuring Yaroldy Abreu, percussion, Dreiser Durruthy Bombalé , batá drums and voice;
Reinaldo Melián, trumpet, Gastón Joya, bass and Rodney Barreto, drums; augmented by three
trumpets and two saxophones. The idea was not to have an Irakere concert, however, he said
then. “This is my group, featuring several generations of Cuban musicians, some living in Cuba,
some not, all celebrating Irakere’s concept — today.”
Another significant, major project in 2015 took place on October 9, on his 74th birthday.
Valdés headlined a historic concert with Chinese classical pianist Lang Lang and the Cuban
National Symphony Orchestra at the Plaza de la Catedral, in Havana, Cuba. The program
included music by Tchaikovsky and Elgar, but also George Gershwin, Ernesto Lecuona, James P.
Johnson, Antonio Maria Romeu and Valdés.
Also worth noting was the on stage reunion with his old friend and mentor, guitarist, composer
and conductor Leo Brouwer, to help close the VI Festival de Música de Cámara in Havana, Cuba
in October 2014. The concert featured the premiere of Concierto de los Ancestros, for piano and
orchestra, which was written and conducted by Brouwer and is dedicated to Valdés.
A month earlier, Valdés was a featured performer in the concert opening the 2014-2015 season
of Jazz at Lincoln Center. The evening also featured trumpeter and composer Wynton Marsalis,
Cuban singer and percussionist Pedrito Martínez and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra.
Valdés was featured in the premiere of the suite “Ochas,” written by Marsalis for piano, batá,
voices and orchestra.
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All these appearances, as well as his solo concerts, continue expanding on the rich vocabulary
set on Border-Free (Sin Fronteras, 2013), a recording featuring his Afro-Cuban Messengers.
The eight compositions, all but one new originals, include nods to flamenco, the Gnawa music
of Morocco and the ritual rhythms of the Orishas, the deities of the Afro-Cuban Santería
religion. There are mentions of hard-bop and danzón but also echoes of Bach, Rachmaninoff
and Miles Davis -- and yet the sum total is a deeply personal and open-ended sound. It’s all
Chucho Valdés.
“Since I was a student I had this idea of taking disparate elements, mixing them and seeing
what happened. And little by little, over time, I’ve found my ways,” says Chucho. “And I love it
because it’s a search that forces you to investigate and study. It’s not all about Afro-Cuban
music. I’m always looking for new things.” The concept in Border-Free “was to do many
different things but all in my own style. Now, that is something very difficult to achieve.”
Dionisio Jesús "Chucho" Valdés Rodríguez, was born in a family of musicians in Quivicán,
Havana province, Cuba, October 9, 1941. His first teachers were his father, the pianist,
composer and bandleader Ramón “Bebo” Valdés, and his mother Pilar Rodríguez, who sang and
played the piano.
At the age of three, Chucho already played at the piano, using both hands, in any key, melodies
he heard on the radio. In fact, there is a famous anecdote that tells the story of Bebo tricking
his friend, the late Israel “Cachao” Lopez, about checking out, with his back to the player, “a
young North American pianist.” Chucho was then four years old.
At the age of five, Chucho began to take lessons on piano, theory and solfege with maestro
Oscar Muñoz Boufartique. He continued his studies at the Conservatorio Municipal de Música
de la Habana, from which he graduated at 14. Chucho also took private lessons from Zenaida
Romeu, Rosario Franco, Federico Smith and Leo Brouwer.
“At home he played jazz: the music of Ellington, Count Basie, and Glenn Miller’s band. I’ve been
privileged. Because Bebo was the piano player at the Tropicana I could see true legend of jazz in
person. He took me to see Nat King Cole, Errol Garner and Sarah Vaughan when I was child
studying music. You can’t imagine the effect that had on my life! It was enormous! Magical!
At 15 Chucho formed his first jazz trio end in December 1958 he worked as a pianist at the
Deauville and St. John hotels in Havana. In 1959, he debuted with the orchestra Sabor de Cuba,
directed by his father, Bebo. That band accompanied the top singers of that era such as
Rolando Laserie, Fernando Álvarez and Pío Leyva.
“My father taught me everything about Cuban music, South American music, jazz, and how to
work with an orchestra,” reminisces Chucho. “ He gave me the piano chair, and stayed on as
director, so I could learn how to work under a conductor. We did our shows and a million other
things with that orchestra, including accompanying shows at the Havana Hilton. I learned a lot
there. He is my idol, “he pauses, then continues. “I don´t say was, my idol. He is my idol. He was
my teacher. He still is.”
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Chucho’s family and professional life took a dramatic turn in 1960 when his father left to work
in Mexico and from there he moved to Europe, where he eventually settled. Bebo Valdés never
returned to Cuba. (Father and son saw each other again 18 years later at Carnegie Hall, where
Chucho was debuting in the United States with his group Irakere. The relationship was fully
restored in 2000, when they met again to play a duet on Calle 54, a film about Latin jazz by
Oscar winning Spanish director Fernando Trueba. The father and son reunion culminated,
musically, in Juntos Para Siempre, a 2007 duet recording that won both a Grammy and a Latin
Grammy. Bebo Valdés died on March 22, 2013. He was 94.)
In the early ‘60s, Chucho worked as a pianist at the Teatro Martí (1961), the Salón
Internacional del Hotel Habana Riviera (1963) and the orchestra of the Teatro Musical de la
Habana (1964-67). In 1967, and after a suggestion of his old teacher, Leo Brouwer, Chucho
organized his own combo.
Still, that same year he joins the important Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna, then directed
by maestros Armando Romeu and Rafael Somavilla. While a member of the orchestra, Chucho
revisited the idea of a small group and, in 1970, he appeared at the Jazz Jamboree in Poland
leading his own quintet.
In 1972, after recording Jazz Batá, an album featuring an unusual jazz trio comprising bassist
Carlos del Puerto and singer and percussionist Oscar Valdés on batá (the traditional hourglass
shaped drums used in the ritual music of the Orishas), Chucho decided to enlarge the group
adding brass and trap drums. That´s the genesis, in 1973, of Irakere, a small, Cuban-style big
band that played an explosive mix of jazz, rock, classical music and traditional Cuban music,
including Afro-Cuban religious music and instruments.
“The ideas for the brass have to do with the work we did with the Orquesta Cubana de Música
Moderna, which was a great big band,” says Chucho. “I tried to imitate that with four horns -two trumpets, a alto and a tenor sax -- and with just that try to have the sound of a big band. Of
course when you have monster players like Paquito D’Rivera, Arturo Sandoval, [trumpeter]
Jorge Varona and [saxophonist] Carlos Averhoff you can write anything you want and it will
work.”
Irakere first made its mark internationally in Finland in 1976. But the following year, the band
was discovered by Dizzy Gillespie in a visit to Havana on a jazz cruise that also included pianist
Earl “Fatha” Hines and saxophonist Stan Getz. In 1978 the producer Bruce Lundvall, then
president of CBS, signed the band for the label. Irakere debuted, unannounced, as “surprise
guests,” at Carnegie Hall as part of the Newport Jazz Festival. As fate would have it, the
program that night also featured pianists Bill Evans and McCoy Tyner, two of Chucho’s main
influences.
Una selección de temas de ese concierto y de la actuación del grupo en el Festival de Jazz de
Montreux, Suiza, conformó el programa del primer disco del grupo lanzado en los Estados
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Unidos. Titulado simplemente Irakere (CBS), la grabación ganó un GRAMMY como Mejor Álbum
de Música Latina en 1979.
Selections from Irakere’s performances at Carnegie Hall and at the Montreux Jazz Festival
comprised the repertory of Irakere (CBS) their debut recording in the United States. The album
won a Grammy as Best Latin Recording in 1979.
The group went on to create an extraordinary body of work that includes great dance
recordings such as Homenaje a Beny Moré (Pimienta, 1989) and Indestructible (Sony, 1997);
explorations of Afro-Cuban religious music such as Babalú Ayé (Bembé, 1999) featuring the
great Orisha music singer Lázaro Ros; as well as ambitious projects such as Tierra En Trance
(Areíto, 1983) and Misa Negra (Messidor, 1987)
Irakere’s lineup went through many changes over the years. Throughout, Chucho remained as
the one, great constant. But success had its costs. Except for the remarkable solo outing
Lucama (Mission, 1986), his talent as a pianist was largely out of sight, obscured by his other
obligations with the band.
Meanwhile, in 1997, Chucho won his second Grammy for his work on Habana (Verve) as a
member of trumpeter Roy Hargrove’s Crisol. The following year, while not completely leaving
Irakere behind, Chucho started a parallel career as a solo player and quartet leader, looking for
greater opportunities to explore and showcase his playing.
“Twenty five years with the same band is a long time,” said Chucho at the time. “I’ve been
wanting to play solo and with a quartet for some time now. My work as a pianist and soloist
gets diluted in Irakere. My job in the group is to be the composer, arranger and musical director
and that’s a completely different role.”
Chucho stayed with Irakere until 2005.
The fruitful period that followed is highlighted by albums such as Solo Piano (Blue Note, 1991),
Solo: Live in New York (Blue Note, 2001) and New Conceptions (Blue Note, 2003), as well as
quartet recordings such as Bele Bele en La Habana (Blue Note, 1998), Briyumba Palo Congo
(Blue Note, 1999) and Live at the Village Vanguard (Blue Note, 2000), capturing a performance
that features Chucho’s sister, singer Mayra Caridad Valdés . The recording won a Grammy for
Best Latin Jazz Album.
There were also Grammy awards for the already mentioned Juntos Para Siempre (Calle 54,
2007), the duet recording with Bebo; and for Chucho’s Steps (Comanche, 2010), featuring his
new group, the Afro-Cuban Messengers .
In total, Chucho has won five Grammys and three Latin Grammys.