"Rezos"

Cuban congero Miguel “Angá” Diaz is a veteran of the Latin Jazz juggernaut Irakere.  He went on to work with musicians broaching the borders of musical genre, like maverick guitarist/producer Ry Cooder, jazzmen Steve Colemen and Roy Hargrove, and trailblazing bassist and bandleader Orlando “Cachaíto” López.  López’s 2001 release Cachaito (World Circuit/Nonesuch) brought DJ sound play into the Afro-Cuban jazz arena, and in that sense, it foreshadowed Angá’s own debut as a bandleader.  But Echu MIngua, named for a Yoruba saint, the “god of crossroads, is bolder still.  This collision of Cuban, African, jazz and DJ cultures lives up to its promise to play as a “religious service.”  This is what ‘50s beatniks would have called “a happening.”  The music miraculously revives the expansive atmosphere of that era, when jazzers were discovering their link to Africa by way of Latin cultures, and artists were spurred on by a passionate new sense that once separate worlds are in fact vibrantly connected in a cosmic-historical web. 

It’s easy to succumb to such poetry while in Angá’s spell.  The ritual begins with a tribute to his home village in Pinar Del Rio, “San Juan y Martinez.”  Angá’s brother sings the town anthem, threading its melody through a richly chaotic weave of ambient voices and drums.  Spirits rising, we flow into “Rezos,” a juxtaposition of Afro-Cuban call and response, elegant danzon, and house mixology worthy of a latter day Charles Ives. 

"Pueblo Nuevo” delivers full-on danzon featuring a spirited, and nearly final, performance by Buena Vista Social Club star and pianist Rubén González.  Rubén’s son Rubencito takes to the keys as well, taking the melody as dad levitates into a sublimely fluid solo.  Uplift is also the mood on “Tumé Tumé” a song provided by Malian tama and ngoni player Baba Sissoko (who was, by the way, a pillar in the original formation of Habib Koite’s band Bamada).  Most uplifting of all, “Conga Carnival” reunites Angá with Irakere pianist Chucho Valdez for a brassy, exuberant party with explosive soloing from Valdez and others.

Angá typically plays a 5-drum conga setup, giving him added melodic possibilities.  He pulls together 7 drums to attempt a conga rendition of the melody on “Round Midnight,” a quixotic project that composer Thelonious Monk would surely have enjoyed.  Better still is Angá’s dreamily grooving read of John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme,” inspired part by the fact that Coltrane had planned to work with African percussion at the time of his death.  Every track here is different and interesting.  The pinnacle comes with “Freeform” in which all this album’s feverish impulses explode together in ecstatic bacchanal.  The Afro-Atlantic experience—musical, historical, and spiritual—has rarely been so well expressed in a jazz context. 

Contributed by: Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org