Hiding in plain sight, Latin influence is everywhere in jazz and popular music forms today and often goes unacknowledged. In her Inaugural lecture Professor Sue Miller demonstrates how these Latin styles evolved historically and shows, through musical examples, how many aspects of these performance practices are embedded in a variety of vernacular dance music forms past and present.
Charanga del Norte live performance at Leeds School of Arts Theatre Wednesday 29 March 6.30pm until 9pm
Tickets
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/charanga-del-norte-performance-tickets-541115851077
Animation by Ged Haney of Charanga del Norte’s track ‘Los Problemas de Atilana’ based on research by Prof. Sue Miller, Dr Sarah Bowen and Cuban dancer Guillermo Davis on the televised version of ‘Los Problemas de Atilana’ by Orquesta Aragón in 1965. The flute solo by Sue Miller is a development of the solo by flute player Richard Egües which was danced by Rafael Bacallao. The animated Rafael here reflects the dance moves and musical gestures of Egües and Bacallao with a few new references and dance moves included for good measure!
An article co-authored by Professor Sue Miller, Guillermo Davis and Dr Sarah Bowen is published in a special issue of the journal Ethnomusicology Forum (June 2022). In it the flute solo of Richard Egües together with the dancing of Rafael Bacallao in Orquesta Aragon are analysed and the article is open access available here online […]
Members of Charanga del Norte Sue Miller (bandleader and flute), Nick Willimas (violin) and Matty Shallcross (percussion) are giving a free Latin music Workshop for Streetlife on Coney Street York Monday 30 May at 2pm. The workshop is free and you only need to register online here https://streetlifeyork.uk/events/latin-music-workshop-day-instrumentalists-vocalists-percussionists
Leeds/UK salsa/Cuban/Latin music pioneer DJ and promoter Lubi Jovanovic celebrates 40 years working in music this year (1982-2022). He’s throwing a few special parties in Leeds to celebrate this landmark including a big live Cuban/salsa/Latin jazz event at The Wardrobe on Friday 10th June. The venue has been the centre of Lubi’s live Latin music shows for over 2 decades now, ever since he brought his legendary ’90s night Casa Latina here in 1999. This gig will also be in the fringe program for inaugural Leeds Jazz Festival which is happening across the city from 1st-12th June.
There are two bands playing. One he has worked with since 1999 (Charanga Del Norte) and one which is a brand new band of musicians studying at Leeds Conservatoire today (Rumberos De Palo). A hot night of Cuban music and rhythms, New York pachanga sounds and smoking Latin jazz. Definitely the live Latin music show of the summer in Leeds.
The workshop is directed by Professor Sue Miller, bandleader and founder of Charanga del Norte since 1998 assisted by pianist and percussion tutor Helen Curtis. The workshop explores a variety of Latin/Cuban music popular styles through a mixture of workshops, sectionals and ensemble catering for brass, strings, guitar, woodwind, percussion, vocals, piano, and bass. In these workshops participants will be exploring the feeling of groove, clave feel, and Latin clave-based improvisation within an ensemble context.
A review of Sue Miller’s book Improvising Sabor – Cuban Dance Music in New York by Sara McGuinness has been published in Ethnomusicology Forum journal and is available online here https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17411912.2021.1989174
The research is based on the analysis of a live performance on Cuban television of ‘Los Problemas de Atilana’ by Orquesta Aragón in the early 1960s, where musical gestures are shown to be embodied in the flute and dance solo ‘duet’ performed by Cuban flautist Richard Egües and dancer Rafael Bacallao, revealing the shared memories of a community bound by common cultural experience. Interdisciplinary in nature, analysis is undertaken by a musician-scholar, a film scholar-practitioner and a professional Cuban dancer-animator in order to unearth details of this embodied repertoire, thus translating and making overt culturally implicit knowledge for those outside of the artistic community of practice, and, in some cases, within it.
“With its gorgeous retro cover art and deliberate golden age smarts Pachanga Time feels like a crate-digger’s rare find… it ‘manages to bottle the fun and liveliness of a genre with tongue-in-cheek flare.” Jane Cornwell.