Machito
Founder of Machito and his Afro-Cubans — Machito (Frank Grillo) led the New York Latin band that pioneered Afro-Cuban jazz and was a dominant force at the Palladium Ballroom during the mambo"> mambo era.
About
Born in Havana, Machito came to New York in the 1930s and founded his Afro-Cubans orchestra with his brother-in-law Mario Bauzá as musical director. The band was the first to explicitly combine Cuban Afro-Cuban rhythmic traditions with jazz harmonies and improvisation, creating what became known as Afro-Cuban jazz or Cubop.
Machito's band was the house band at the Palladium Ballroom during the mambo"> mambo era, and he was one of the defining figures of New York Latin music. His recordings — from the early bebop-influenced experiments to the big mambo"> mambo era hits — document the full development of the Afro-Cuban jazz tradition.
Mambo
In Cuban music, especially in salsa and son,
the " mambo" section typically refers to a brassy, rhythmically intense instrumental break,
often featuring repetitive horn lines, call-and-response patterns, and building energy toward the climax of a song.
Mambo
In Cuban music, especially in salsa and son,
the "mambo" section typically refers to a brassy, rhythmically intense instrumental break,
often featuring repetitive horn lines, call-and-response patterns, and building energy toward the climax of a song.
Son dance is the foundation of all Cuban popular partner dancing — smooth, intimate, grounded, and musical. Every Cuban dance style that followed ( mambo"> mambo, casino, timba"> timba) builds on the body vocabulary and structure established by son.
Lees meer >Cuban Dances Originating in Havana
Havana, the cultural heartbeat of Cuba, played a central role in the creation and evolution of several iconic Cuban dances. Some were born directly in the capital, while others were transformed there into the forms we know today.
Lees meer >Mambo was Cuba's first global music explosion — the form that put Cuban rhythms on dance floors from New York to Tokyo in the late 1940s and 1950s, and the direct ancestor of the Latin big band sound.
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