Testimonials Biography Contact us News classes Salsa videos Salsa DVDs Links

1 2 A 3B 4C 5D 6 E 7F 8G 9H 10I 11J 12K 13L 14M 15N 16O 17P 18Q 19R 20S 21T 22U 23V 24W 25 X 26 Y 27 Z

Airport Parking and Hotels - Pre-book secured airport parking at any UK airports including Gatwick, Heathrow, Manchester, and Birmingham.

Learn about Celia Cruz and Tito Puente, UK

Find out about celia cruz and tito puentes music. Uk

Historical Latin and Caribbean singers and musicians

Celia Cruz

BIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY

Although the Cuban-born music known as salsa, like other forms of Latin jazz and dance music, has been primarily male-dominated, its biggest vocal star is female. Celia Cruz has a powerful voice that transfers the rhythmic energy of salsa into the vocal medium, and she has been a prominent figure in the music since the beginnings of her career in Cuba in the 1950s. Leaving Cuba for the United States after the Castro takeover in 1959, Cruz has become a true legend of Latin American music and something of an emblem of Latin American identity.

The early facts of Cruz's life are somewhat obscure.

Always reluctant to discuss her age, Cruz--according to some accounts--was born in Havana, Cuba, on October 21, 1924. Growing up in the city's poor Santo Suárez neighborhood in a household of 14 children (some were her cousins), she stood out because of her singing ability. Cruz won a singing contest called "La hora del té" and with her mother's encouragement began to enter other contests in various parts of Cuba.

Traveled on Streetcar to Contests Sometimes Cruz would travel to the contests with a cousin named Nenita. "I was very skinny and tiny," she told Billboard. "And since the tram cost five cents each way and we didn't have enough money, I'd sit on Nenita's lap, because she was bigger. The drivers knew us and, sometimes, they'd let me sit on the seat beside her, if it was empty. One time, we had no money to return and we walked back. We arrived at 2 a.m."

Cruz's father, however, believed that she should become a teacher, an altogether more common profession for a Cuban woman at the time. She enrolled at the national teachers' college, but dropped out after finding more and more success with her music in live and radio performances. Something of a compromise was reached when she enrolled at Havana's National Conservatory of Music--but there a professor encouraged her to consider a full-time singing career.

Her breakthrough came in 1950 when she became the lead vocalist for a big band called La Sonora Matancera. Bandleader Rogelio Martínez showed faith in Cruz when he continued to feature her despite the protests of fans of the band's previous vocalist, and once again when an American record executive resisted the idea of making a Sonora Matancera disc that featured Cruz, believing the a rumba record with a female vocalist would not sell well. Martínez promised to pay Cruz himself if the recording flopped. It did well in both Cuba and the United States, and Cruz toured widely through Central and North America with La Sonora Matancera in the 1950s.

Group Fled Cuba At the time of the Communist takeover of Cuba in 1959, the group was slated to tour Mexico; from Mexico, rather than returning to Cuba, they entered the United States and remained there. Cruz herself became a U.S. citizen in 1961. Cuban Communist leader Fidel Castro was furious and barred Cruz from returning to Cuba, enforcing the ban even after Cruz's parents' deaths. Cruz for her part has vowed not to return to Cuba until such time as the Castro regime is deposed. In 1962 she married La Sonora Matancera trumpet player Pedro Knight. Although Cruz had made numerous recordings with La Sonora Matancera, she experienced little success in the United States in the 1960s. Although she spoke English well she refused to record in the language. Younger Hispanic Americans at the time were gravitating away from big-band dance music and toward rock-and-roll, in both Latin and non-Latin inflections. Cruz's fortunes began to improve when she meshed her talents with those of the musicians and bandleaders who were creating the new music called salsa--chief among them Tito Puente, Johnny Pacheco, and Willie Colón.

Salsa was firmly rooted in Cuban dance traditions, but it was a high-energy new hybrid that incorporated elements of jazz, traditional Afro-Caribbean rhythms, and other forms. It was an ideal medium for the showcasing of Cruz's vocals, for she was both an exciting improviser (she is known for her vocal imitations of instruments in the manner known as "scat" singing in the jazz world), and a singer with the power to stand up to an intense rhythm section. Cruz on stage was a commanding figure whose control over audiences resulted not only from her flamboyant, stage-filling attire, but also from her ability to engage them in call-and-response patterns that spring from salsa's Afro-Cuban roots. Recorded for Fania Label

In 1973 Cruz appeared in Hommy, a Spanish-language adaptation of the Who's rock opera Tommy. Her reputation spread both within and beyond the Hispanic community in the 1970s after she signed with the new salsa label Fania and recorded with a cream-of-the-crop lineup, the Fania All-Stars, drawn from its stable of artists. The Fania All-Stars album Live at Yankee Stadium (two vols., 1976) documented the power of her performances. Cruz has appeared in several films, including The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (1992) and The Perez Family (1995).

One of Cruz's performance trademarks is a full-throated shout of "Azucar!" (Sugar!); she explained its 1970s origins in a 2000 Billboard interview. "I was having dinner at a restaurant in Miami, and when the waiter offered me coffee, he asked me if I took it with or without sugar. I said, 'Chico, you're Cuban. How can you even ask that? With sugar!' And that evening during my show ... I told the audience the story and they laughed. And one day, instead of telling the story, I simply walked down the stairs and shouted 'Azucar!'" Cruz might be compared with U.S. jazz vocalist Sarah Vaughan in her ability to bring vocal techniques to a primarily instrumental music, but she has a more essentially popular appeal than any jazz singer. Seemingly indestructible vocally, Cruz continued a full schedule of concerts and recordings throughout the 1980s and beyond.

She received a Grammy award for the album Ritmo en el corazón, recorded with conga player Ray Barretto, in 1990, as well as an honorary doctorate from Yale University.

Still a major star in her own right, Cruz became an inspiration for numerous younger performers (such as Gloria Estefan) in the 1990s; her audience hardly aged along with her. "We've never had to attract these kids," she told Time. "They come by themselves. Rock is a strong influence on them, but they still want to know about their roots." For most Hispanic Americans, indeed, Celia Cruz has been and remains a much-loved figure, an icon of Latin culture. PERSONAL INFORMATION

Born on October 21, 1924; died on July 16, 2003, in Fort Lee, New Jersey; raised in the Santo Suarez neighborhood, Havana, Cuba; came to the United States in 1960, and became a citizen in 1961; married Pedro Knight, trumpeter, 1962 Education: Studied at National Conservatory of Music, Havana, Cuba, 1947-50. Addresses: Record Company--Omar Pardillo-Cid, RMM Records, 568 Broadway, Suite 806, New York, NY 10012; Agent--Bookings Online Talent Agency, Ltd., 236 West 26th St., Ste. 701, New York, NY 10001.

AWARDS

Grammy Award for Best Tropical Latin Album, 1989, awarded medal by President Bill Clinton from the National Endowment of the Arts, 1994. CAREER

Began singing on Cuban radio in the late 1940s; became lead singer of Cuban big band, La Sonora Matancera, 1950, recording and touring with them until 1965; joined Tito Puente Orchestra, 1966; recorded eight albums with Puente; sang the role of Gracia Divina at Carnegie Hall in Hommy--A Latin Opera (adaptation of Tommy), 1973; signed to Fania label and performed with Fania All-Stars group, 1970s; appeared in The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love and The Perez Family; has recorded over 50 albums, 20 of which became gold; performed worldwide. WORKS

Selected discography • The Winners, Vaya, 1987. • Best, Sony/Globo, 1992, originally issued on Fania Records. • Best, Vol. 2, Sony Discos/Globo, 1994 (more Fania-label music). • Canciones Premiadas, Palladium, 1994. • Irrepetible, UNI/RMM, 1994. • La Tierna Conmovedora Bambolea, Palladium, 1994. • Homenaje a Los Santos, Polydor, 1994. • Celia and Willie, Vaya, 1994. • Cuba's Queen of Rhythm, Palladium, 1995. • Canta Celia Cruz, Palladium, 1995. • Irresistible, Sony Discos/Orfeon, 1995. • Fania All-Stars, Sony Discos, 1997. • La reina de Cuba, International, 1997. • Azucar Negra, UNI/RMM, 1998. • Fiestón Tropical, Orfeon, 1998. • Mi vida es cantar, RMM, 1998. • Tributo a las Orishas, International, 1999. • Celia Cruz and Friends: A Night of Salsa Live, RMM, 2000. • Siempre vivire, Sony, 2000. • On Fire: The Essential Celia Cruz, Manteca, 2000. • La negra tiene tumbao, Sony, 2001. • Recuerdos de Cuba, Orfeon, 2002. • Carnaval de Éxitos, RMM, 2002. • Su Favorita Celia Cruz, Secco. • Reflexiónes De Celia Cruz, Secco. • Bravo Celia Cruz, Tico. • With Tito Puente Cuba y Puerto Rico Son, Tico. • El Quimbo Quimbumbia, Tico. • Alma Con Alma, Tico. • Algo Especial Para Recordar, Tico. • 100% Azucar: The Best of Celia, Rhino, 1997. • Cuba's Foremost Rhythm Singer, Secco. • Con Amor: Celia Cruz with La Sonora Matancera, Secco. • La Incomparable Celia and Sonora Matancera, Secco. • Feliz Encuentro, Barbaro. • Nostalgia Tropical, Orfeon. • Celia and Johnny, Vaya. • To find out links Celia Cruz UK please cut and paste this email into your email account: thomasoflaherty@yahoo.com

Tito Puente

1923-2000 Musician

Tito Puente is internationally recognized for his seminal contributions to Latin music as a bandleader, composer, arranger, and percussionist. Known as "El Rey," or The King of Mambo, he has recorded an unprecedented 100 albums, published more than 400 compositions, and won four Grammy awards. "In a day when pop singers fake their way to the top and when for many artists, success is the child of hype, Puente is one of only a handful of musicians who deserve the title 'legendary,'" Mark Holston stated in Américas. Credited with introducing the timbal — a double tom-tom played with sticks — and the vibraphone to Afro-Cuban music, Puente also plays the trap drums, the conga drums, the claves, the piano, and occasionally, the saxophone and the clarinet. While Puente is perhaps best known for his all-time best-selling 1958

mambo album Dance Mania, his eclectic sound has continued to transcend cultural and generational boundaries. As a testament to his popularity with a younger audience, Puente has recorded with rocker Carlos Santana and has performed regularly at college concerts throughout the country. He has also appeared in several films, received a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and performed on television's The David Letterman Show.

Early Musical Leanings

Ernest Anthony Puente, Jr., was born on April 20, 1923, in the Spanish Harlem section of New York City. Shortly before his birth, Puente's parents had left their native Puerto Rico to settle in the East Side of Harlem known as "El Barrio" for its large Hispanic population. While his father, Ernest Anthony Puente, Sr., worked as a foreman in a razor blade factory, his mother, Ercilia Puente, was the first to notice her eldest son's musical talent, enrolling him in 25-cent piano lessons when he was seven. As a child Puente also attended a dancing school and played baseball before seriously injuring his ankle in a bicycle accident.

Although Puente received his first formal musical training in the piano, he always took an interest in percussion. Wanting to emulate his idol, drummer Gene Krupa, Puente began studying drums and percussion around the age of ten. "I was always banging on boxes, on the window sill," he once admitted in an interview with the New York Post's Edmond Newton. Also a member of a schoolboy quartet, Puente grew up listening to a variety of music, including Latin artists such as Miguelito Valdes and jazz musicians Stan Kenton and Duke Ellington.

While still in his early teens, Puente began playing weekend gigs near his home. "My father used to take me to the dances," he told Down Beat 's Larry Birnbaum. "At midnight I was already falling asleep." By the age of 15, Puente had dropped out of high school to take a winter job with a Miami Beach band, where he played Americanized rhumbas and a variety of Latin-American rhythms, including tangos, waltzes, and paso dobles. When he returned to Manhattan, Puente was hired to play drums with the orchestras of Noro Morales and José Curbelo, the latter of whom would later become Manhattan's first mambo king. Puente's first big break came when the United States entered World War II; after the regular drummer of the famous Machito Afro-Cubans was drafted into military service, Puente was given the opportunity to demonstrate his talents. "For perhaps the first time in Latin music," Holston wrote, "the timbales were brought to the front the bandstand." Puente, showing early signs of his trademark showmanship, also revitalized the band by playing the drums standing, instead of from the conventional sitting position.

Puente's tour with the band came to a temporary halt when he too received his call from the military; for the next three years Puente served on a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier in the South Pacific. His military stint, however, provided several positive experiences. Not only did he have a chance to learn the saxophone — which he taught himself to play while on the ship — but he had the opportunity to further his education through the G.I. Bill. In what he has cited as one of the best decisions of his life, Puente enrolled in New York's Juilliard School of Music, where he studied composition, orchestration, and conducting. Many of the compositions and arrangements he wrote during this period were played by Machito and the other leading Latin band leaders of the day.

Becoming the King of Mambo

Following his continued work as a sideman with Machito and Curbelo, Puente formed his own band, The Picadilly Boys, in 1948. A regular at New York's famed Palladium, Puente — along with Perez Prado and Tito Rodriguez — helped popularize the new dance music from Cuba called the mambo, a fast, staccato Afro-Cuban form that Puente defined in the New York Post as "a particular rift that's repeated several times." Mambo, along with cha-cha, guaguanco, merengue, and other Latin styles, were later known collectively as " salsa, " but Puente has rejected the commercialized term, arguing that what he plays is music, not sauce. With early hits with Tico Records such as Ran Kan, Abaniquito, El Yoyo, and Picadillo, Puente "electrified dancers across America and ... catapulted into the front rank of Latin bandleaders," according to Birnbaum.

By the mid-1950s Puente had succeeded in gaining both a large Hispanic and Anglo following. In a 1956 poll conducted by the New York daily La Prensa, Puente was voted "King of Latin Music," beating out his competitors Prado and Rodriguez. Two years later, RCA released Dance Mania, which became a perennial international best-seller.

While continuing his reign as the "King of Mambo," Puente also began playing in New York jazz clubs such as Birdland and The Royal Roost, recording albums with trumpet player Doc Severinson like Puente Goes Jazz and Night Beat that attempted "to find a marriage between Latin music and jazz," Puente told Birnbaum. "I was trying to play jazz but not lose the Latin-American authenticity." About his years of playing jazz, Puente said in an interview with Alan Feuerstein in Planet Salsa, "I let my "typical" music go for a while and went into Latin jazz." But he clearly felt the new excitement over the music he had helped establish in this country. "Everything that was popular is coming back after twenty or thirty years — take a look at fashion, TV programming, and that applies to music as well. ... When I finished recording my 100th album, it was back to "typical."

Puente unexpectedly entered another genre of music in 1970, when California rocker Carlos Santana converted one of Puente's old songs, "Oye, Como Va," into a Top 40 hit. Seven years later the two teamed up for a memorable Manhattan concert. As Pablo Guzman described in Village Voice, "Puente conducted his fifteen-piece orchestra with snaps of his head and sweeps of his hands while playing timbales; at one point, when he signalled with his trademark stick over the head gesture, the entire brass section, spread in a row along his left, rose as one and played counter to itself. Folks went wild."

In 1979 Puente won his first Grammy award with a tribute album to Beny Moré, Homenaje a Beny. That same year he established a personal scholarship fund at Juilliard to recognize Latin percussionists in the United States. The Tito Puente Scholarship fund "gives a young Latin percussionist an incentive to learn how to read music, so that when you go into a recording studio, you know what you're doing," as Puente explained to Birnbaum. "It's not only what you learn in the streets — you've really got to go and study." Puente has continued to strengthen his commitment to the future of Latin music by performing regularly at colleges and universities across the country. "The new generation of Central and South American students want representation on campus," Puente told Down Beat 's Fred Bouchard. Work in the 1980s and Beyond

During the 1980s, Puente concentrated his efforts on blending the best of Latin and jazz music into his unique style. "Sometimes jazz can be boring, but I give it a new twist," he explained to Bouchard. "Latin music can be boring, too, because it's only tonic and dominant. [You take an] exciting progressive melodic line, then combine it with exciting rhythms ... that's the marriage we're after. You gotta know about jazz to play these things." Two more Grammy awards during the decade — and a fourth in 1990 — confirmed that Puente was still at the top of his performance. His compositions, too, have evolved over the years. According to Bouchard, Puente has written "more sharply" and "conceiv[ed] more hiply" in the early 1990s than in his previous work. Puente remarked to Feuerstein about his 100th album: "I did this album live.... I had everybody come in and play at the same time — not the trumpet on Monday and the sax on Thursday [because] I'm a dancer.

I must dance in the studio while the whole band is playing to see if ti really works ... When you hear this album ... you'll feel the beat, you'll feel the vibrations — because this type of music was played and recorded like I did in the old days." While continuing to produce solid albums, including a record 100th in 1992, Puente has become more visible to a mainstream audience. In addition to performing at the White House since the administration of President Jimmy Carter — who introduced him as "The Goodwill Ambassador of Latin American Music" — Puente has made several appearances on The Bill Cosby Show and The David Letterman Show. He played some of his own music in the movie The Mambo Kings, an adaptation of Oscar Hijuelos' Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, and has been honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He was awarded an honorary degree at Columbia University in 1999, and the Latin Grammy for Best Traditional Tropical Performance for "Mambo Birdland" in 2000.

Although in his 70s by the early 1990s, Puente — who with his wife, the former Margie Asencion, has three children — maintained a busy touring schedule that took him to Russia, Japan, and Puerto Rico. But in January 1994, he told Vionette Negretti of the San Juan Star that he planned to reduce his pace: "There's a lot of young people out there who need to develop their talents and old-timers like me have to give them space." Puente died after undergoing heart surgery on May 31, 2000, in New York. He was 77. SELECTED DISCOGRAPHY:

Dance Mania, RCA, 1958. Puente Now!, GNP Crescendo, 1960. El Rey Bravo, Tico, 1962. (With Santos Colon) The Legend, Tico, 1977. Tito Puente and His Latin Ensemble on Broadway, Concord Picante, 1983. Un Poco Loco, Concord Picante, 1987. (With Phil Woods) Salsa Meets Jazz, Concord Picante, 1988. (With Sheila E and Pete Escovedo) Latina Familia, Jazzyvisions, 1989. Goza Mi Timbal, Concord Picante, 1990. END.

free salsa tips,

FREE SALSA TIPS

The art of salsa. Dance tips for salsa lessons and salsa workshops

Dance lessons are excellent for improving confidence.

whattowearontheday.html What to wear to your salsa dance class or salsa workshop.

articles.html

salsa pictures and salsa photo images,

photos1.html The art of salsa dancing.

dance history,

salsa Learn the history of salsa dancing. The music, the dance, learn about the art of salsa dancing.

learn about the history of africandance.html African dance formed the base of many dances in the world.

Thedevelopmentofcourtdances.html European court dance formed the basis of many Afro Caribbean dance styles.

Learn the roots of merengue.htm Merengue has its roots in African and European music and relates to 18^thC. slavery.

Learn the history of break dance.html Break dance has African roots and jazz dance from the 1920s.

How the Morris dance came about.html The Morris has many theories on its origin, including one from the Middle East.

scottishdancing.html

Dance teachers training courses and work experience,

Jobsindance.html If interested in teaching salsa dancing click here.

VOLUNTEER.htm To volunteer to teach salsa dance. Start working in the fitness industy.

UKASYLLABUS.html The syllabus for dance examinations for salsa with the United Kingdom Alliance.

You can qualify to teach salsa workshops and salsa private lessons.

weddings and hen parties,

wedding dances.html Getting married and need a private dance lessons for your wedding reception?

hennights.html Hen nights, celebrate your hen night or hen day with a salsa workshop. Hen parties for fun.

Find function rooms in the UK Venue hire from hotel conference centres to halls and function rooms.

salsa lessons

salsa bands,

Manteca.html Live salsa music from UK bands. Dance the night away with the best live salsa music.

Manolito y su Trabuco.html You can purchase the latest salsa music from local salsa bands.

Lido66.htmL Salsa cds and salsa music for promotional purposes from Lido66.

salsa nights,

nightlife.html

SALSA EVENTS.htmL Dance classes and salsa parties.

misc,

danceinaday.htm Private lessons for beginners in Birmingham.

corporateevents.html dance classes for corporate events in Birmingham.

Student Packages.html Salsa workshops for students.

Singles.html salsa in Birmingham for single people.

Learn to dance Salsa in a day.html birmningham based dance teachers. Salsa lessons for all dance levels.

Groups.htm

singles.html

Going out,

Hotels.html Find hotels in Birmingham. Hotels in and around Birmingham city centre and Broad street.

Takeaways and restaurants offering takeaways in Birmingham.

Chinese and Pizza takeaways Takeaways in Birmingham.