Hispanic Magazine - January/February 2005

Roots Music -- Artists explore traditions and innovation.
By Mark Holston

Great talent is where you find it, and in this case, the blessed zone is Eugene, Oregon. Far from the hotbeds of Latin music, singer and composer Jessie Marquez has carved out a niche for herself in the Northwest's nascent salsa scene. She also scored a major career coup when she returned to Cuba, her parents' native land, to record an album of tropical Latin classics and originals with some of Havana's top musicians.

Sana Locura (available only at her website, www.sanalocura.com) features sensational arrangements by trombonist Juan Carlos Marín, the sinuous trumpet playing of Julito Padrón, and the equally impressive talents of a cast of supremely talented Cuban musicians. The program includes revered works by Miguel Matamoros, Ignacio Piñeiro, Rafael Hernandez, and several of the singer's originals. The recording of Sana Locura was a rite of passage for Marquez, who has longed for years to return to the land that nurtured her grandparents and parents and experience the music she loves at its source. She adapts effortlessly to the Cuban salsa style with a commanding vocal presence, highlighted by a sincere, evocative delivery with a sensuous edge.

The names are familiar and the elegant packaging looks oddly familiar, but, no, it's not another batch of releases from the Buena Vista Social Club. But for lovers of this brand of old-style Cuban music, it may as well be. Hecho en Cuba (Escondida Music) is a three-volume CD collection of vintage works featuring Compay Segundo, Ibrahim Ferrer, Ruben Gonzalez, Omara Portuondo, Eliades Ochoa, and other veterans of the "BVSC" wave that inundated the world with the classic Cuban sound almost a decade ago. For those thirsting for another blast of this irresistible music, served up in dazzling fashion, these releases of rare gems are highly recommended.

Colombian pop vallenato icon Carlos Vives channels the rustic genre of Colombian folk music that he has helped make a worldwide favorite into the realm of rollicking, party-time rock on the appropriately titled El Rock de Mi Pueblo (EMI). Cumbia, porro, and son corrido rhythms are also interwoven with rock rhythms and accordion riffs, hugging Vives' swaggering vocals with an invigorating sound that resonates joyously from Santa Marta, Colombia, to California.