This is my homage to Melquiades Fundora who died on 14 February 2009

I have played alongside him with La Sublime in Havana in 2006 and 2007 and this performance at the Cabaret Nacional in Havana  on April 6th 2009 was a tribute to him as one of the founders of Orquesta Sublime in 1955.

Melquiades Fundora played the flauta de cinco llaves and there’s an interview with him on the publications page of this site. The new CD ‘Look Back In Charanga’ will be dedicated to Melquiades and Richard Egües.

Melquiades Fundora and Sue Miller in the Cabaret Nacional in 2007

Jesus Cos, Sue Miller and Ernesto Oviedo pre-gig

In Havana in 2009 I performed with Orquesta Sublime which was great and playing with Jesus Cos, one of Cuba’s finest traditional Charanga timbale players was a fantastic experience. I  also guested with Estrellas Cubanas, inspired by the wonderful singing of Ernesto Oviedo – the three of us here are dressed up ready to go and perform  at the Teatro America. I had to put on a frock as these old guys sure know how to dress up smart!

Melquides Fundora

The following interview took place in Havana in 2001.

SM: Interview:
MF: My name is Melquiades Fundora Dina. I was born in Nueva Paz, a village just outside Havana, on 20 March 1926. My first teachers were my parents. My mother played the double bass and my father the trumpet. I learnt to read and write music and play by ear through listening and playing. It was difficult to study music formally if you lived in the countryside before the revolution so I went to Havana and asked for tips from maestros like Arcaño. I learnt a lot from Orquesta América, José Fajardo y sus Estrellas and Aragón.

SM: I love the names of these Charangas: ‘Arcaño y sus Maravillas’ (Arcaño and his Marvels). Fajardo y sus Estrellas (Fajardo and his Stars), Orquesta Sensación. (Sensational Orchestra) and La Sublime (the Sublime)! No false modesty there! At present you play with Orquesta Sublime – could you tell us a little about the history of this group?
MF: Orquesta Sublime began on 21 January 1956. We were a group of young men who at that time had no intention of making a living from music – we just wanted to enjoy ourselves. Our first recording was of ‘El Peletero’ (the cobbler) and ‘El Cartero’ (the postman), two chachachas. ‘El Peletero’ was written by Iladio Alisa and ‘El Cartero’ by Victor Lay. From the moment we recorded these numbers we became a hit with the public and we went on to record ‘Union Cienfueguera’, a danzón by Enrique Jorrín, and ‘Seis Perlas Cubanas’. In less than four months, the band became a national name.
More recordings followed. At that time, there were three record companies in Cuba, including Panart and Puchito records. We were signed to Panart and were busy recording and playing at dances. At the end of 1959 we played at the ‘Breyford Pie’ in Miami where we met with huge success. At this time, Orquesta Aragón was also recording and playing dances. We were younger than Aragón’s musicians but we always got on well together. In fact, in 1956 we played ‘Pare Cochero’ and ‘Cachita’ with Aragón at a concert. Later on, we began to compose our own numbers.

SM: Has Sublime toured abroad much?
MF: We spent six months touring Mexico. In 2002 and 2003, we’re touring the Cayman Islands, Spain and Germany. Envidia records launched our new CD, Que Viva la charanga, in January so we’re touring Germany after it comes out.

SM: La Sublime is best known for playing pachangas, isn’t it?
MF: Yes, we are known as the ‘Pachanguera’ of Cuba. Let me tell you a little about the development of the Charanga. To begin with, you had Charangas like those led by Chapotín, ‘el Chocolate’, then Arcaño, then América, Aragón and la Sublime. These days, modem Cuban bands all sound like each other – there’s nothing to distinguish between them. We in the charangas however all had our own sound: you could listen and say, ‘Oh, that’s Aragón’ or, ‘Oh, that’s Ia Sublime’.

Melquides Fundora
Melquides Fundora

SM: Yes, the flute playing of Richard Egües is unmistakeable. His sound and improvisation are so distinctive.
MF: Also, the 5-key wooden flute is very powerful and very difficult to play. You have to battle with it to get the right sound. Friends often ask me, ‘How do you get the sound you want with that flute?’ It is difficult to stretch and cover the holes, as there are only five keys. The problem now is that younger musicians are too scared to learn the 5-key flute. They are no longer being manufactured and it’s not taught any more at music colleges. There’s only a handful of 5-key flute players in Cuba at present.

SM: Were there a lot of Charangas in the 1940s?
MF: Oh yes: Fajardo, Siglo XX, La Mélodia 40, Arcaño, Orquesta Union, Orquesta Joseito Femandez, Orquesta Paulin Alvarez. The most famous flautists were Fajardo, Arcaño, Juan Pablo Miranda. Richard Egües has been my main inspiration.

SM: Can you tell us more about the Cuban flute style?
MF: Yes, I’m often asked about this. A flute player from the US came to see me, wanting to jam, and he confused jazz with the Cuban style of playing. In jazz, you improvise on a theme; but it’s different in Cuban music. For us, music is much more of a rhythm thing – we play to lift our spirits, while we walk, talk, smile… we feel the syncopation and play from the heart. Jazz is freer, in that there is less structure to the arrangements. Cuban music has sections such as the mambo and the estribillo. All the instruments (violins, congas, piano, bass and so on) have a specific function. The piano keeps the montuno going, the percussion maintains the rhythm, the flute improvises… In Cuban music, you have to know the particular sections of an arrangement and when to play an ‘efecto’ (break) together, for example.

SM: Does Cuban music generally have more sophisticated arrangements than jazz?
MF: Yes, but it is spontaneous too; there is a lot of improvisation. In rehearsal, musicians read the music (except the percussionists), rather than learning arrangements by ear. All danzones, chachachas and son styles have written arrangements.

SM: Can you tell us about the particular styles of music associated with charanga?
MF: Over the years, charanga has undergone many changes. Arcaño and Romero played danzones, then there was the new rhythm movement. Then Orquesta América entered into musical life, and when they went to Mexico, Aragón came to the fore with the chachacha craze and we followed on with the pachanga. We played a lot of pachangas: a faster kind of chachacha. But we played lots of others styles too, like bolero, son, guaracha and afro. The charanga sound is created by the line-up itself – one flute, two or three violins, güiro, congas, timbales, singers.

SM: What hopes do you have for the future?
MF: To play music, music and more music!
© Sue Miller, Leeds, March 2003

Melquiades Fundora flute player and founder of Orquesta Sublime

The following article was written for the British Flute Society Magazine – PAN: March 2003.

Some people confuse the Cuban style of music with Jazz. In fact, the Charanga is quite different. Sue Miller examines the Charanga flute styles of Richard Egües, Eduardo Rubio (both from Orquesta Aragón) and Melquiades Fundora (from Orquesta Sublime). You will find unfamiliar terms in the GLOSSARY.

The Cuban Charanga developed in Cuba at the beginning of the 20th century, replacing the brass-led Orquesta Típicas, which played habaneras, danzonetes and danzones. The Charanga line-up consists of a flute (originally a 5-key wooden flute, but the Boehm system is also used), violins, piano, bass, timbales, güiro, congas and vocals. The Charanga has at its heart the warm sound of the acoustic violins, over which the flute improvises in the high register and above the range to E.

Most Charanga compositions are in the keys of D, G, C, A and E (majors and minors) and occasionally F. These are the keys that suit the strings best; salsa arrangements tend to use flat keys as they are more suitable for Bb and Eb instruments.

Many characteristics of the flute style derive from the ornamentation used on the 5-key wooden flute – these turns and mordents have in turn been incorporated into the modern Charanga flute vocabulary on the Boehm flute. The Cuban flute style developed from improvisation within the danzón and the chachachá and is diatonic and classical in nature. Compared to jazz, Cuban flute improvisation entails more arpeggiated figures and is less chromatic in nature. It is virtuosic in a different way. The rhythmic nature of Cuban music requires phrasing to be well placed – in fact, the Cuban solo style could be described as ‘dancing with the rhythm’. The flute sound is clear, high and assertively articulated. The notes in general are short and tongued.

Well-known exponents of the Cuban flute style are Richard Egües, Eduardo Rubio (‘Chen’), Melquiades Fundora, Joaquín Oliveros (Orquesta Rubalcaba, Frank Emilio Flynn, Oliveros y su All Stars), Polo Tamayo (Cachaito), Manuel Wanbrug (Orquesta América) and Maraca Valle (his styles ranging from charanga to jazz to rumba).

The article after this is an interview with Melquiades Fundora, 5-key wooden flute player from Orquesta Sublime, and I have also included transcriptions of solos by Melquiades, Richard Egües and Eduardo Rubio. By examining their solos, I hope to demonstrate the characteristics of the Cuban flute style. In fact, you may like to have a go at playing them yourselves, remembering of course that they are all played an octave up, with notes reaching up to top E above the range.

Of the above list of names, Melquiades, Joaquín, Polo and Wanbrug play the 5-key wooden flute exclusively. Richard Egües, the virtuosic flute player and composer (who with bandleader Rafael Lay made the group Orquesta Aragón famous in the 1950s [see article]), learnt on the Boehm flute, transferred to the 5-key flute and finally returned to the Boehm flute. Whichever flute he uses, however, he has his own distinctive sound and soloing style. If you look at the transcription of a short solo of Richard’s in the danzón ‘La Reina Isabel’ over the chord progression I, V7 in D minor you can see that he uses the note common to both chords, the A, as an axis for his phrases. The rising motif at bars 80 and 81 is typical of Richard’s style – a motif developed from the outset in this compact little solo.

Eduardo Rubio, as Richard’s successor in Aragón, has assimilated Richard’s style while maintaining his own sound. In his solo on Yaye Boy over the chord progression I, V, V, I in A minor he transposes the main motif at bar 82 in various places (with subtle variations) and again uses rising motifs to build his solo. While diatonic in nature, Chen’s solos tend to use more chromatic motifs than Richard’s (e.g. bars 149 and 150). Phrases typical of the Cuban flute style in general occur in bars 108 to 109, and 161 to 163 in this solo.

Octave leap motifs on the dominant are very common – see the flute solo by Melquiades on Sabroso como el Guarapo (composer: Marcos Perdomo). This solo is a pretty busy one, heavily articulated and in the top register. Melquiades is still playing away in the top register like this today at the age of 76 so all that diaphragm work must be good for you! However, constant exposure to these high frequencies can be pretty damaging to one’s hearing so short notes rather than sustained long ones at the top are to be recommended.

If you would like to know more about Cuban music and play it yourself I run Cuban music workshops in the form of a Cuban Music Big Band at Yorkshire College of Music in Headingley, Leeds. Masterclasses by visiting Cuban musicians and salsa specialists are held once a term. More information is available on the website.

© Sue Miller, Leeds, March 2003