Cal Tjader tribute albums

[Conclave]

There are a few fantastic tribute albums to Cal Tjader that have been around

for a few years. The best ones being :

Pancho Sanchez- Soul Sauce- Concord

and Dave Samuels -Tjaderized- Verve

An overlooked album is by Louie Ramirez - A Tribute To Cal Tjader - Bele Bele

Jazz Club with Paquito D'Rivera. It's very tasty!

Louie was a NYC musician who had Vibe Sextet like Cal's in the 50's and 70's.

He was also a great timbalero and big band arranger, just about on a par with

Tito Puente. He never made a big name but he was one of the giants on the

NYC music scene. One of his best Vibe albums is" Vibes Galore" on Alegre

[mikeweil]

I have yet to hear the Poncho Sanchez - being Cal's last conguero, he is the perfect keeper of the flame.

Haven't heard Louie Ramirez either, regrettably, his records are hard to get over here - what label is his tribute on? I sure would like to get me this! Any reliable online source for these?

The Dave Samuels disappointed me somewhat - too polished, despite the participation of Eddie Palimieri and Ray Barretto the groove is so different from Cal's bands. Samuels is a great vibist, but far from that unique combination of simplicity and groove that Cal had. And the rhythm sections are too "modern" to catch the specific feel of the Tjader bands.

Just my thoughts, of course.

Edited May 3, 2005 by mikeweil

[DMP]

I agree about the Samuels - a slight disappointment, although if you're at all a fan of Tjader you'll want to have it. The Sanchez is good. Are these still in print?

[mikeweil]

The Sanchez is in print - more info on the Concord Records website.

According to the Verve website, the Samuels is still in print, but used copies are readily available too.

[mikeweil]

At last I located the Ramirez:

A Tribute To Cal Tjader

Paquito D’ Rivera and his Latin Jazz Ensemble with Louie Ramírez

Featuring: Paquito D’Rivera (sax), Louis Ramírez (vibraphone), Tony Barrero (trumpet), José Fajardo (flute), Mario Rivera (flute and saxo), José Mangual (percusión), Ray de la Paz (vocals)

REFERENCE: YY9427

PRICE: 15.45 €

1. Latin Blues

2. Milestones

3. It could apeen to you

4. Mambo for Cal

5. Soul Sauce

6. Lullaby of Birdland

7. El Títere

8. Noche de Salsa

The Yemaya label is available from Fresh Sound Records - Dusty Groove imports this from time to time.

[chris olivarez]

I have the Poncho and Dave Samuels and both are very nice. That's a great looking lineup for the Louie Ramirez-I'll have to snag that one too.

[Conclave]

I agree,Tjaderized is not exactly in a Tjader bag,it is strictly a new school sound.

But the Sanchez tribute is quite good.The vibist, Ruben Estrada,is not ashamed

to virtually copy Cal's licks cold.The sound and feel of the 60's& 70's is there.

If you like the small vibe combo latin jazz /Afro Cuban sound,

a few other groups to check out besides Louie Ramirez are :

Bobby Montez. He was vibist based on the west coast who sounded a lot like

Cal, except he used more voices. He recorded six or seven hit albums, a few

are still available on CD. One of his best albums is "Jungle Fantastique"

Joe Cuba Sextet. Joe was a conguero with vibes, piano, bass,timbales and

side percussion complement. He was based in NYC and has a number of albums on vinyl and CD. Though he didn't play in depth musically, his group was, I think,

the tightest rhythmically I ever heard. One of his best albums is "Stepping Out".

Going back to the early 50's there was Joe Loco and Pete Terrace and even Puente had a vibe sextet for a few years. Maybe it was George Shearing who actually started the small vibe Latin combo sound in the late 40's ?.

[chris olivarez]

Thanks for the tips Conclave. I will definitely investigate. Not meaning to hijack the thread or anyting but do you have any recommendations for Chombo Silva?

[Conclave]

Chris:

The only recordings I have of Chombo Silva are with Cal on Mas Ritmo Caliente and Tjader goes Latin on Fantasy. I always liked his big juicy sound that reminded

me of Coleman Hawkins.

I seem to remember he played sax with the Tito Rodriquez big band, after Cal,

around the NYC area.

[chris olivarez]

Conclave:

I'm not sure that I was terribly convincing but I really do like the Sanchez cd and Poncho just seems to be getting better all the time. While I think that the Samuels "tribute" isn't quite as good as Poncho's it still very good IMO.

As for Chombo-I'll just have to look further into his recorded output. It's hard for me to believe that a guy who sounded that good could be so underrecorded but I guess it would hardly be the first time.

[Conclave]

Since we're talking tribute albums, there is a "Tribute to Chombo"

on RumbaJazz that's super. It has David Sanchez playing the Chombo

sax parts faithfully.

A lot of Cal's tunes are featured. Unfortunately, this was recorded after

Chombo's death.

Incidently, Chombo also played violin in the Cuban Tipica Charanga style

where the violins play the staccato sax vamp parts.

[chris olivarez]

Once again Conclave thanks for the tip.

[mikeweil]

Since we're talking tribute albums, there is a "Tribute to Chombo"

on RumbaJazz that's super. It has David Sanchez playing the Chombo

sax parts faithfully.

A lot of Cal's tunes are featured. Unfortunately, this was recorded after

Chombo's death.

Actually, Chombo was scheduled to play this session but passed shortly before ...

[mikeweil]

Incidently, Chombo also played violin in the Cuban Tipica Charanga style where the violins play the staccato sax vamp parts.

Examples of his excellent charanga violin can be heard on two of Mongo Santamaria's Fantasy CDs:

At the Blackhawk Fantasy FCD-24734-2 (tracks 7-14, some tenor sax as well)

Watermelon Man Milestone MCD-47075-2 (bonus tracks 13-18, more live tracks from the Blackhawk)

The latter includes Mongo's hit album. Any fan of Tjader will enjoy this for sure. Sidemen include Willie Bobo, Joao Donato, René Hernandez, Victor Venegas, Julio Collazo, Victor Venegas, and another great charanga violinist, Pupi Legaretta. The riffs the violins, horns or guitars play are called guajeos in Cuban music, BTW.

[Conclave]

Just got back from a week in south Florida.I visited the Cuban

section of Miami on Calle Ocho for some great food and sounds.

It's amazing that the sounds heard were like stepping out of a

time capsule, back to the 50's and 60's. The older people maintain

their folklorico traditions to a fault; not being interested in any nuevo

suenos. I heard a lot of Son, Son Montuno and Guaguancos, but no

Charanga.

The younger crowd seemed to be more into Reggaeton, which is

a combination of Reggae, Latin Rap and Hip Hop........ Not exactly

my cup of tea.

The other variations I heard were Salsa Romantica,with extremely

sweet and sticky lyrics and predictable uptempo arrangements,

and lightening fast Merengues. Ugh!!

What a pleasure it was to put a stack of Cal, Machito,Tito R.,Tito P.,

and Eddie P. CD's when I got back.Some of the best Engineered Music

ever made.