You won’t get more bang for your Latin music buck all year than at Cary’s Regency Park this weekend. If you’re a grown-up, $15 gets you six bands and some folkloric dance troupes for good measure at the Festival Ritmo Latino this Sunday, July 10 (niños under 12 are free). Graze and gaze at the […]
Sylvia Pfeiffenberger
Bio: Sylvia Pfeiffenberger lives in Durham and hosts a weekly Latin music show on WXDU.
Posted inMusic
Timba 101 with Tiempo Libre
In 1960, New York became the melting pot for Afro-Cuban rhythms by default. Cut off from La Habana, La Gran Manzana became the birthplace of salsa. Meanwhile, far from stagnating, Cubans behind the iron curtain (and especially since the end of the Cold War) have been in permanent musical revolution. Intensely trained in classical conservatories […]
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Chano’s Ghost
“It’s what we call in New York ‘all up in your face’ Latin jazz,” said Wilson Corniel Jr., the Nuyorican conguero who leads Grupo Chaworo. He brought his five-piece ensemble to Raleigh on June 4 to give local residents a taste of “jazz with some rice and beans on it.” It was part of a […]
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Show stops
The earthy mingled with the urbane at the old campground of Shakori Hills last month, as Ricardo Lemvo kicked off the four-day festival in the dance tent on Thursday night. Relaxed but with typical joie de vivre, Lemvo brought his unique palatte of soukous-merengue hybrids and Cuban son-inflected salsa. Some young horn players with mariachi […]
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“It’s our time”
Spanish Harlem Orchestra’s 2003 debut Un Gran Dia En El Barrio was like balsam in the desert for fans of New York salsa. With this year’s Best Salsa Grammy for Across 110th Street, the mantle of the mambo kings and queens has officially passed. Spanish Harlem Orchestra plays May 1, and musical director Oscar Hernandez […]
Posted inArt
Bringing messages home to Nuestro Barrio
Love, jealousy, betrayal, temptation and deceit. Those are the time-honored ingredients of a good soap opera, but what do they have in common with the normally dull, dry details of credit reports, mortgages and interest payments? The answer is Nuestro Barrio, a new educational telenovela written, produced and filmed in North Carolina. The first three […]
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Sonidero night at Disco Rodeo
A sonidero is like a traveling block party–a private enterprise of DJs, MCs and sound guys with their own equipment who will turn up the volume for a fee in your local barrio or colonia. Several sonideros from Mexico were at Disco Rodeo on a recent Friday night, and 96.9FM La Ley’s van was parked […]
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in visibly moving
Venezuela’s most uninhibited dance band is back, and they’re bringing the fonqui. Los Amigos Invisibles are Cheo, Jose, Julio, Juan, Mauricio and Armando, and nobody gets a crowded dance floor moving like these sexy fellows. With solid grooves and lyrics that would make Prince blush, their music leans toward the ’70s but with a futuristic […]
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Brazilian night at Cafe Verde
I’m not sure what all goes into a capirinha, but I know there’s sugar at the bottom. Holy Samba–that’s Eduardo de Souza’s jam band–has a standing gig on Fridays at Cafe Verde, where the lime-flavored cocktail is a house specialty. De Souza sings, plays congas and the tambourine-like pandeira, which gives Brazilian rhythms their characteristic […]
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Stocking stuffers for Latin lovers
Cachao Ahora Si Bonus DVD (Cineson, 2004) If Cachao’s Ahora Si is what aging gracefully sounds like, this geriatric genius of Afro-Cuban music may be redefining assisted living. The elder statesmen of the upright bass has made another must-have recording–so what else is new? His late ’90s Master Sessions were truth in advertising. His participation […]