Mongo SantamarÃa
Ramón " Mongo " Santamaría ( born April 7, 1922 in Havana, Cuba as Ramon Santa María, † February 1, 2003 in Miami ) was an American percussionist Cuban origin. He is regarded as a father figure of the Afro Cuban Jazz.
Life and work
Santa María grew up in a poor neighborhood. After initial violin lessons, he subsequently moved to the drums and later to conga and other percussion instruments. Early on, he left the school to make themselves in the local scene of Havana a name. In 1948, he played in Mexico with Perez Prado, with whom he moved to New York in 1950, where he continued to play with the likes of the first Latin jazz and salsa big bands, such as with Tito Puente Alberto Socarras, Dizzy Gillespie (1954) and later with the Fania All Stars. 1957 to 1960 he worked on the West Coast with Cal Tjader. In 1958 he recorded his debut Yambu plate, followed by Mongo (1959). The music composed by him and contained on Mongo jazz standard " Afro Blue " was interpreted, among others, John Coltrane. For his interpretation of Herbie Hancock's " Watermelon Man " in 1963, with whom he reached # 3 on the Adult Contemporary and # 10 in the pop charts, he was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998. In 1977 he was awarded for his album Dawn with a Grammy. In 1978 he gave a concert in Havana, played along with the Cuban musicians, and broke the ice in the musical field that prevailed politically between the communist Fidel Castro's Cuba and the United States. In 1982 he took as part of the West Berlin festival Horizonte Festival of World Cultures ( No.2, 1982) at a large salsa concert in the Berlin forest stage part.
In the last two decades, he played a reinforced albums with Afro- Cuban music and jazz, with whom, however, he was unable to sustain his commercial success.
His nephew, the percussionist Roberto Santamaria, continues the musical tradition of his uncle.
Discography (selection)
- " Tambores y Canto " (1955)
- " Mongo " (1959)
- " Mongo en La Habana " (1960) with Carlos Embale Merceditas Valdés and
- " Sabroso " (1960) - with Tresero and composer Andrés Echeverría
- " Mongo 's Way " (1971) - Armando Peraza with
- " Up from the Roots" (1972 )
- " Amanecer " (1977) - won a Grammy
- " Red Hot " (1979)
- "Mambo Mongo " (1993)
- " Mongo Returns" (1995 )
- " Conga Blue" ( 1995)
- " Come on Home" ( 1997)
- "Summertime"
Lexigrafische entries
- Richard Cook Jazz Encyclopedia London 2007; ISBN 978-0-14-102646-6
- Wolf Kampmann, Loeb Classical Jazz Encyclopedia. Stuttgart, Reclam, 2003; ISBN 978-3-15-010528-3
Weblink
- Obituary in The New York Times