List of artists or bands to check out

[Omelenko1]

For us guys over 50 there were two schools. The Habana school which Tata Guines spearheaded and the North of Habana school spearheaed by Mongo. Tata, very clean execution a lot of technique. Mongo very hard hitting, very rich sound on account of his bongocero beginings and his direct African ancestry. Everyone evolved from these two shools, Ray Barretto, Frankie Malabe and most NYC and Left Coast congueros such as Poncho evolved from Mongo. From the Tata Guines Habana school you have the likes of Changuito, Anga, Giovanni (yes Gio spent many summers in Habana), Pedrito Martinez, Vizcaino to mention just some names. I know Chano came first, but the real seeds were planted by Mongo and Tata, the 2 main schools.

Dario

[pcastag]

Anga likes to say there are two cuban schools, Tata and Changuito.

[Anonimo]

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[Joseph]

Here is an other example back in the 60's we had a great conga player very simular to Giovanni played with 4 drums like many today, a real monster on drums. Even Giovanni when playing uses some of his tactics and admitted to using them. Frank Malave a real talented conga player.

Here is a profile of Frank Malabe written by Bobby Sanabria:
http://www.descarga.com/cgi-bin/db/archives/Profile18

Maybe he didn't reach the heights of fame and recognition, but he certainly was creative and influential.
A life well lived.(musically, at least)

[jorge]

One of the best records I have heard of Frank Malabe playing 3 congas is En Una Nota by Monguito Santamaria (Mongo's son, a piano player). Listen to NeNe, Apariencia na ma, Arriverderci Roma and a few others, he really shows his style. Not sure how available the CD is, you can always download rip off copies for free if you are into that. Great album, it also happens to be Hector Casanova's first as a lead singer.

[JohnnyConga]

Please check out Frankie Malave on the Alegre All Stars In Orbit and his "classic" conga solo on Manteca...we all wanted to cop his solo from the record...You guys today weren't around when these guys were at the top of their skills..I'll say it again...I have met some of the most incredible drummers on this planet NOBODY will ever hear.Why? Because they are loners, or don't care about notoriety or fame and fortune.. they play to live and live to play... Thank you Leedy...WE were there(you a bit before me)...short story I was walking around the east village-NYC one summer and I heard drums coming from an apartment building..so I followed the sound and it was really tripping me out...I went into the building and looked for the apartment.. I found it and listened outside the door for a few minutes and I was hearing stuff I never heard before on a conga drum...i knocked and a Afro-American brother opened the door ..I introduced myself as a player and was interested in what he was doing...he was playing all kinds of odd time stuff I never heard before..I dont remember his name and he never became known to anyone..but the Brother played like no other I had ever met at that time...also let's throw in the late great Conga drummer Bill Fitch...nobody played like him either...and was already recording with Cal Tjader when he was just 21 years old...check out his work on the classic Sona Libre album....he was waaaaaaaaaaaay ahead of his time on the drum...

[jorge]

...What J C and Abakua are saying is totally correct all have been done before the new conga players are just copy's of the old...

I don't think that is what JC and Abakua or even you mean to say. Saying guys like Giovanni and Pedrito are just copies of Mongo, Tata and Chano Pozo is just plain wrong. You could take it the next step and say Mongo was just a copy of Chano. But we all know Chano was just like "qualquier cubano" in the 40s, rumbero del barrio who also played and led comparsas. I am sure you could say the same about his predecessors that he learned from. So how far do you want to go back with that flawed argument?
A better way to see it is that all of them come from a very rich culture of music, drums and African rhythm mixed with some Spanish and Creole influence, and all represent different aspects of that culture, and different outside influences. Where your statement is wrong is that all have contributed a huge amount of their own personal creativity in addition to mastery of the culture that was there before them. Sure, there is a strong tradition of trying to make individuals interchangeable in Abakua and other Afrocuban culture, but there is also a strong thread of fierce individual creativity and these guys do both well. Saying they are copies of their padrinos and the greats that influenced them is being very unfair to all. More like they are standing on the shoulders of those they learned from and played with. Some of them have said as much, con mucho orgullo. So Leedy2 please stop with the inaccurate exaggerations. In reality we are not really disagreeing about anything, but when you make obviously false overgeneralizations like the quote above, you just fan fires of disagreement where none really existed.

So keep on everyone naming names and building this list. Please try to tell us which specific songs, albums, websites, etc, so people who don't have huge complete collections can have some hope of benefitting from your recommendations, and at the same time support the guys who are out there today carrying on the tradition of mastery of the drum.

[JohnnyConga]

Your right!.. that is not what I was saying..BTW YOU and I Jorge...we sat together on the same bench with Morty and his son back in 1972 on them Sunday Rumbas...so I know we have jammed together at that time...JC

[Anonimo]

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[jorge]

Leedy2, now you are talking. Cuba made huge contributions and additions to the roots that came from Africa. In the same way, Mongo and Tata and others made huge contributions beyond the foundations that Chano Pozo and others in his older generation had laid. Most notably raising the conga and bongo and the musicians who played them to a level of respect and acceptance in Cuban society, and later in other countries, that they had not had before. So the next generation benefitted from that, your generation and later, and so forth. On that note, I was really happy to see the video that someone posted of Candido at 90 playing Siboney with Xiomara Laugart and her son Axel, Mauricio Herrera on bongo, and others in the young generation that are now carrying the ball and pushing it forward. As a piano player and arranger, Axel Tosca Laugart is one of the young rising stars to follow in the next few years.

JC, yeah, we probably jammed together in rumbas in the 70s although early on I mainly carried my drum to the park, played for a minute or two, got yelled at, and then wound up watching other guys play it all afternoon, then carried it home. You were probably one of those guys, along with Abie, Felix, Skip, Yeyito, although they did occasionally take the time to show me a pattern to practice for the next week. I did pick up bits and pieces here and there and got to play more and more each year. It took me a while to figure out that carrying claves was a lot easier than dragging my conga, and I would be more likely to get to play them for a whole song.

Leedy2 you are invited to come tonight to la Esquina Habanera to check out our Saturday rumba. You can give me your history class during the breaks, and sit in if you want. Rumba moderna, guarapachangueo y mas. We hit at 10. 1401 Summit Ave corner 14th St in Union City. PM me I will give you more info. We usually play until 1 but if you leave by 12:30 you will get home before I do. Others in NYC / NJ area are invited as well, every Saturday night 10 pm.

[bongosnotbombs]

New players are not copies of old, each new artist brings something new to the drum. Why is it that everyone thinks congas players can't be new or innovative? Can't have their own style? Can't bring anything new to the table. Other instrument players can, no one says Coltrane was a copy of someone else, or Charlie Parker. Mongo, Francisco, Anga, Giovanni, Tata, Pedrito, Sandy, etc, are all innovators and unique players that no one else is like and are not copies of anyone. It has not all been done before, there is so much still to explore with the conga.

[pcastag]

Everything we do is built upon the shoulders of those who came before , there are some who think that it all ended back in their generation, but that always seems to be the case. Mongo, patato, candido, chano all set the foundations for those who followed here in the the states, many more greats stayed in Cuba, to me the biggest innovation came when people started doing what tata had benn doing ( doubles) with his left hand with both hands. That opened up conga chops to a whole nother level. I would imagine that all those folks who came from Habana back in the 40's and 50's also owed a lot to the rumberos and cajoneros from their barrios, so it is what it is, conga technique has definitely advanced, but music is still music and chops don't make a musician.

[Anonimo]

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[pcastag]

Cubas contributions to music the timbales, bongos and what is known the modern conga drum and a vas amount of tropical rhythms . What came from Africa is mostly Religion Abacua, Lucumi ,Yoruba etc.. What has happen throughout the years and as slave of that time used to beat a drum with no specific rhythm just beat to beat. People embraced with time these beat that they were playing with is today known as Toques de santos many I have even heard Ritmo Lucuni which then in turn like every comment gets twisted around when many people are involved. .

I'm confused by what you're saying cuco, are you saying that when the Africans came to Cuba they didn't have any developed rhythms? It sounds like you're saying they just beat on drums and people started to call those toques. I'm sure you understand that the toques are highly developed, some of the most complex rhythims coming out of cuba, and they definitely have their origins in nigeria. that's been wel documented.
PC

[JohnnyConga]

Ok guys you really have to research your history and not make it up, or believe it happened the way YOU think it happened
First there were millions of slaves over a 500 year period...Not ALL African tribes use drums or drumming in their villages ..You have to imagine hundreds of tribes thrown together(that couldnt even talk to one another, as there are thousands of dialects in Africa) that knew nothing of each other or each others cultural practices. The Bantu were the ones who first started drumming in Cuba..and created the first drum-Ngoma...the Yoruba who came much later to Cuba brought the Bata(in their memory, and recreated them in Cuba, and mind you the Bata in Cuba are not even the same as the ones in Nigeria)...it took hundreds of years of development for these now Afro Cubans to develop what drumming they knew or could remember...and not all could play drums either or wanted to...so it was this amalgamation of tribes that created the drumming in Cuba...the Bantu and the Yoruba...if your serious about learning anything about Cuba and it's history I recommend Ned Sublets book ....it's the BIBLE on Cuba....