Rumba Sin Fronteras

opis:
Pancho Quinto
is a master of the bata, the Yoruba ceremonial drum, as well as of the quinto, the lead drum used in the rumba, which has its roots in the Cross River Delta among the Efik and the Efo.

Interviewed on his '98 tour to the US, Pancho said: " I play a polyrhythmic rumba. I never go outside the Cuban rumba, and I play that perfectly, but I add to it, as if I had a whole drum set in my hands. And I play many instruments, like cajon [wooden box], bata, bells." Recent album: "En el Solar la Cueva del Humo," with Round World.

Quinto continues to pay bata at toques and his group is called Anagi: "this is the name of my saint in the Yoruba religion. He is a boy, a mischievous boy, but he's good, and I love him a lot and respect him.

Pancho Quinto is pleased by the reception he got on his '98 American tour and speaks happily of the collaboration with Bellita, a young pop-jazz pianist who trades songs with him and sometimes sings along on his numbers. At 65, Quinto is becoming famous: " I have played all my life. I worked on the docks, but I always lived with the music and never left it. I taught other groups that traveled and became famous, but I kept on working, as a modest person, more as a teacher than a performer. " Quinto was in the US several years ago with Yoruba Andabo, a group known for its rumba and strong Congo music.

"I never wanted to be famous, but now that I am old, now my destiny wants to make me famous. But I don't care about that. I don't want to be Nat King Cole or anybody. I am just a humble man, playing for my people, for Cuba, and for all the people of Latin America and all over the world."


Editor's info:
Pancho Quinto's music is a unique cross of rhythmic and harmonic elements rarely heard in contemporary music and features innovations in Cuban rumba percussion. Rumba Sin Fronteras highlights the spirit of improvisation that makes Pancho such a major force in the development of Cuban music and one of the world's great percussion innovators. On this recording, generations of musicians collaborate in a stunning mix of Afro-Cuban and African-American traditions, creating a 'rumba without frontiers'.

BBC Music Magazine
[. . .] Since his days as an omo ana (or consecrated drummer) in Havana's carnival scene, Pancho Quinto has taken percussion from anything even faintly like an accompaniment role and thrust it firmly into the lead - always with gusto and the technical brilliance the solo drum demands.
Fifty years on, his fusions of Afro Cuban and African American rhythms just get more audacious and unrepentantly purist. Listen to track one on this album, laid down in a single, frantic day in 1998 while on a tour of the US: "La Gorra"'s 'vocals' are the clap and clatter of empty boxes and the refrain 'Se la llevo' a mere pulse to tap your foot to.
Given his collaborators - maverick Omar Sosa on piano, Enrique Fernandez on an assortment of scintillating saxes - Quinto can't keep other sounds down for long. But this disc is where to turn for complex constructions built around the cajón as well as the bata (two-headed drum played with hands), the quinto (conga for solos) and the tres golpes (larger conga) - played by Quinto and four other percussionists - and the conversations these hold are as tight and twisting as the improvs of a jazz band or scored deliberations of a string quartet.
Track 4, with the volume up on Sosa's piano, is loungier than the other numbers, but isa sweet, suggestive interlude, this is rumba as religion and more old-style, spiritual trance than dance. What impresses most is the crispness of it all, the lack of blur and audible disdain for lazy, lulling melodies.
He might be worshipped as the premier fusioneer of Angolan, Congolese and Yoruba music, and as a tireless, instinctive genre-hopper, but Pancho Quinto holds back from over mingling his traditions - you can hear every instrument, and every beat, on this record for itself - clear, clamorous and never quite chaotic. [. . .]
by Chris Moss

All Music Guide
[. . .] Just avoiding the pitfall of the stereotypical aged Cuban performer making a comeback with his traditional arts and classic stylings, Pancho Quinto turns Cuban rumba on its ear with Rumba Sin Fronteras. The basis of the album is the classic rumba format, but innovations come thick and heavy throughout thanks to Quinto's guarapachangeo innovations. The bata drums, a signature addition of Quinto's, make themselves heard clearly, as does a deep cajon or two. A pair of vocalists from San Francisco mix up the phrasing of their lyrics a bit, adding a slight edge to the syncopation that adds a bit of tension, but not so much as to be noticed in its own right. The Afro-Cuban mood is extremely strong, with the bata providing much of the feel. Along with the bata, a stray, African-style marimba shows up in "Sosa en el Pais de las Maravillas," enhancing the connections further. The album opener shows off ties to quiet storm R&B for a while with keyboard riffs before moving into a more proper rumba again. Piano, bass, and sax make "Bolero en Medio del Carnaval" into a jazzy affair reminiscent of Dizzy Gillespie's landmark Afro Cuban Jazz Moods in many ways, but with perhaps an even stronger clinging to the jazz side. The mix of genres is fluid throughout the album, with the Afro-Cuban coalition represented by the guarapachangeo style being an extremely strong one, powering its way through even the slowest of melodies with a breakneck speed. While the rumba on its own is a nice genre, the modified rumba here is something really worth hearing. While on the fringes of the Cuban revival, Pancho Quinto is on the forefront of innovation. [. . .]
by Adam Greenberg
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