#ray barretto

[jcsnyc3]

De Donde Vengo Ray Barretto

[aci25]

Ray Barretto en Plaza Sésamo en enero del 1977

Hace 47 años, el lunes 24 de enero de 1977, ‘Plaza Sésamo’ estrenó su episodio #0966, grabado el 28 de septiembre de 1976. En dicho episodio, la estrella invitada fue Ray Barretto, quien acudió al show con Ray Romero y Jimmy Delgado para hablar sobre los ritmos latinos.

[doomandgloomfromthetomb]

The Fania All Stars - Yankee Stadium, New York City, August 24, 1973

For your hot August nights in 2023 — a very hot August night in 1973 ... in more ways than one! This Fania All Stars extravaganza must've been an incredibly fun night in the Bronx, a half-century ago this week. A double LP of highlights came out a few years later, as did this somewhat hard-to-come-by documentary. The transfer here on YouTube is not the greatest (it deserves a high-tech cleanup a la the Summer of Soul footage) but that's OK, the footage itself is phenomenal. And hey, we get Geraldo Riviera popping up occasionally to give us some of the finer points of Latin music ... thank you, Geraldo.

Things got fairly wild towards the end of the night, as detailed in Will Hermes classic Love Goes To Buildings On Fire:

"By the time the Fania All-Stars get into their own set, the crowd, which has been prohibited from going onto the field, is getting restless. The band launches into [Larry] Harlow's fire-spitting 'Congo Bongo,' and by the end — with Ray Barretto and Mongo Santamaría dueling furiously on tandem congas, and Billy Cobham, wearing a football jersey, thundering beneath and between the beats, lifting everything skyward — the crowd erupts. They burst past the barricades and swarm out over the field, dancing, cheering, and waving Puerto Rican flags. Jerry Masucci's brother Alex, one of the co-producers, is freaking, because he knows he can kiss that $50,000 deposit on the field adios. He tries to get the orchestra to stop, but they keep pounding it out, Johnny Pacheco conducting wildly in an unbuttoned white dress shirt and stacked heels, hair flying like a crazed Caribbean Beethoven."

[citizenscreen]

Ray Barretto (April 29, 1929 – February 17, 2006) Pictured performing in #NYC in 1977🪘

[musicollage]

Deodato - Prelude. 1972 : CTI.

[ support the artist ★ buy me a coffee ]

[soulmusicsongs]

Mi Ritmo Te Llama - Ray Barretto (Hard Hands, 1968)

[vinyl-artwork]

Ray Barretto – Que Viva La Musica (1972) Cover painting by Walter Velez

[krispyweiss]

Album Review: Various Artists - Summer of Soul (…Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised) Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Welcome to Soulsville, U.S.A., aka Harlem, Manhattan, New York City, scene of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, aka the Black Woodstock.

Finally out in the wake of the 2021 film that made it possible, Summer of Soul (…Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised) Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is a trip back in time to a festival that was essentially lost to history until Questlove got his hands on the video archives and made his directorial debut.

Now, here comes the audio; 17 tracks and 80-plus minutes minutes of aural documentation replete with stage announcements, perhaps as a nod to the unofficial Black Woodstock moniker, and the Chambers Brothers setting the stage with “Uptown.”

The sound quality is flat, to be expected from half-century-old tapes that moldered in storage all those decades. The sounds; however, are extraordinary, the crossroads of B.B. King’s blues (“Why I Sing the Blues”); the 5th Dimension’s pop (“Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In”); the gospel of Mahalia Jackson and the Staple Singers; the jazz of Mongo Santamaria‘s “Watermelon Man;” Sly & the Family Stone’s psychedelia; and a touch of Motown R&B and soul courtesy of David Ruffin’s “My Girl” and Gladys Knight and the Pips’ “I Heard it Through the Grapevine.”

The artists’ messages are as diverse as the artists themselves, from Ray Barretto’s plea that people come “Together” before it’s too goddam late to Nina Simone’s query “Are You Ready” to kill if necessary. Is your mind ready?

Incredibly, it all holds together via the sheer strength of music and community. The sound is an issue; however, the fact the recordings survived in listenable condition is a miracle worth experiencing.

Grade card: Various Artists - Summer of Soul (…Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised) Original Motion Picture Soundtrack - B

2/1/22