• Submitted by: admin
• Music
• 07 / 26 / 2010

Back by popular demand: Cuba's legendary Septeto Nacional to embark on second US tour in September 2010  Tour promotes September Album of Sin Rumba, No hay Son from Harmonia Mundi, World Village Records New York, NY.

Septeto Nacional, the famed Cuban son group founded by music pioneer Ignacio Piñeiro, will return for their second U.S. tour from September 1--September 20, 2010.

The Septeto Nacional U.S. Tour 2010 promotes the group's new album Sin Rumba No Hay Son, coming soon in late September from Harmonia Mundi/World Village Records.

After playing to sold-out crowds across the country in 2009, Septeto Nacional is preparing for another exciting run in 2010 with scheduled performances at the Monterey Jazz Festival and Yoshi's Jazz Club San Francisco.

From World Village Records: The upcoming album release of Sin Rumba No Hay Son captures seven musicians in their modern prime, revealing the skill, taste, and chops gained over four unbroken generations even as the players are audibly driven to revive, invent and surpass.

Each of the 14 selections unfurls like rum-tinged cigar smoke, swooning, exuberant, sexy and plaintive; as intricate as chamber-music, as liltingly sensual as a slow-dance, as sweetly guileless as a lullaby, as primal as the throbbing heart of a conga drum. Coming soon on World Village! http://www.worldvillagemusic.com/anglais/artistesfiche.php?artist_id=141

Leo Tizol, producer of Septeto Nacional's 2009 and 2010 tours, is the first promoter to bring the group to the U.S. “Last year's tour was truly historic and ground-breaking. What an experience! I'm proud to say that it opened doors for Septeto Nacional and for other Cuban groups coming to the U.S. Latinos and non-Latinos alike got to experience the thrill of seeing this amazing group perform live.

This year's tour will feature music from their newer albums but will also include many of Ignacio Piñeiro's classic compositions. Septeto Nacional remains timeless because they never stand still. Don't miss out on their performances. Get your tickets early!"
Septeto Nacional Ignacio Piñeiro

Septeto Nacional Ignacio Piñeiro are paragon interpreters of son, Cuba's national music genre par excellence. Decades before the Buena Vista Social Club, the septet performed the compositions of its namesake, transforming them into international standards of the son tradition.

Septeto Nacional, was formed in 1927 by the first superstar of Cuban son, Ignacio Piñeiro. Born and raised in the working class Havana neighborhood of Pueblo Nuevo, Piñeiro epitomized the urban sonero. He started out as a brilliant rumbero, and he was a well-known akpón or lead vocalist of the santería chant tradition.

A bassist, vocalist and composer, he composed Échale salsita, perhaps the best known son of all time, and the source, according to some, of the term salsa by which son's successor was to be known. The tune tells the story about a night out on the town and the savoring of the finest sausage in the world; it was appropriated by George Gerschwin who worked its theme into his famous “Cuban Overture."

Another of Piñeiro's tunes, Suavecito, relates how delightful it is to dance son tenderly embracing one's partner and confining one's movements within the perimeter of a single floor tile.

Its enchanting lyric, el son es lo más sublime para el alma divertir (son is the most sublime thing to entertain the soul), has become a mantra for son aficionados throughout the world. Among Piñeiro's most popular opuses are Esas no son cubanas, Bardo, No juegues con los santos and Coco mai mai.

Many credit Piñeiro with being the first to introduce the trumpet to the traditional sexteto, thus creating the septeto format which endures to this day. He is also credited with making son music acceptable to all strata of Cuban society when he took Septeto Nacional to the World Exposition in Seville in 1928 where it created a sensation.

Until then, son was the music of workers and peasants. Like jazz and tango, it was also the music most associated with houses of ill repute; it was even banned in Havana until the mid 1920's. But the recognition son gained when Septeto Nacional visited the “Mother Country" was the seal of approval which paved the way for son to be played and danced at high society ballrooms and country clubs.

After Piñeiro's death in 1968, the septet had a succession of leaders of renown, including guitarist/composer Rafael Ortiz, legendary rumbero Carlos Embale, and guitarist Richard Aymee Castro.

Tour dates as of July 24, 2010

Source: www.allaboutjazz.com