"I still remember when [Candido], Mongo and I were young guys in Havana and Francisco Aguabella over in Matanzas.
All four of us had regular gigs by day and were ripping it up, playing our tambores at the nightclubs all night long. By day, Mongo was a mailman, Candido worked at the super mercado and I sold fruits /veg's and had a loan shark business on the side with my cousin. And anyone wondering where Francisco attained his physical strength and endurance, he worked as a longshoreman and would be lifting 300lb sacks all day long, alongside the stoic sindicato de Abacua, who controlled the waterfront at that time.
. . . When I returned to Cuba in 2002, one of the most surprising things to me was how integrated la rumba y la religion Africano was into everyday Cuban life. Whether people met me for the first time or if I was with my family, nobody wanted to see me play drums but they did demand to see how I danced rumba. It was a challenge thrown to me to prove that I was still Cuban...to prove that I still had my Afro-Cubanismo. By the way, I passed every test!"
In my years of research, I've tried to find a family member of Carlos Vidal, but have been unsuccessful.
We would all certainly benefit from in-depth interviews with Armando and Candido about the old days. There is surprisingly very little written on the subject.
I think that Armando was recently in the hospital with internet access because for a couple of weeks he was posting multiple times a day on the Yahoo Latinjazz group.
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