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(An
interview with band leader Sue Miller)
How
I came to this music
In
the mid-nineties I was really into Salsa and went regularly to the
Casa Latina club in Leeds to hear both UK Salsa bands and visiting
Cuban bands that played there once a month.
At
a dance class I heard a track by 'Cachao' called 'Mambo' which featured
flute and violins (Charanga) that really excited me and when a visiting
Cuban musician said he had some records for sale with flute on I
bought them from him - one of them was an old 1950's record of 'Orquesta
Aragon' and the flute improvisations on it were spine-tingling -
the player was the famous flautist Richard Egues.
Through
meeting Cuban musicians at the Casa Latina I got to go to Cuba in
1998 to visit a Charanga festival in Palma Soriano near Santiago
de Cuba.
On
the way there our plane was grounded in Havana for a day due to
a cyclone and quite by chance I met a violinist at the closed-down
airport who took me to meet Richard Egues. He asked me to play for
him whilst he accompanied me on piano (with the violinists joining
in).
It
was a dream come true for me and Richard took me on as his student
later on in 2000, once I'd raised the cash to go back to Havana
to study.
I set
up Charanga del Norte (Charanga from the North) in 1998 with a view
to performing original arrangements and compositions in the Cuban
Charanga style.
The
line-up is led by violins and flute ("Charanga") together
with electric bass, piano, vocals, timbales, congas and güiro.
Where
we play
In
2003 we did a UK tour covering venues from Aberdeen to Sidmouth
and including the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester providing support
to Buena Vista virtuoso Eliades Ochoa.
We also released a new 2-track CD "Don't Panic" in June
2003.
The
songs
'Me voy pa Moron' is a lively classic Charanga track featuring improvised
solos from the flute and violin and a vocal call and response section
called 'coro/guia' .
The
number swings along with hypnotic violin riffs, piano montunos and
a driving percussion section.
'Cubana drop' was originally written about our precarious plane
journey across Cuba during a cyclone with all its ups and downs
and nail-biting tensions.
However
with the addition of Osvaldo Chacon's vocals the song is now a homage
to beautiful Cuban women! This is Cuban Charanga with a Salsa feel
featuring the explosive timbales of Salsa star Roberto Pla.
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