El Viaje

Conservatory-trained Cuban-French pianist creates lovely, listenable, playful music with his brother and other well-trained musicians; impressive piano technique! This guy never runs out of notes or interesting tunes and riffs

No FCC's; Favorite tracks: 1, 4, 6, 8, 9

*1- Me Voy Pa' Cuba – (5:35) – very happy piano music with skippy beat and vocalization and bass segues to some Spanish lyrics with piano punctuation

2-- Africa – (5:07) – quieter, with deeper notes, then speeds up with lyrics

3 – Feria – (3:55) – nice interweaving of voice, piano, percussion, bass –nimble piano playing

**4- Lobo's Cha (5:25) – has a French feel and sound with a Latin beat; lovely staccato

5 – Bacalao Con Pan (3:39) – beat picks up with more drum, straight-ahead beat by piano which opens out into serious improv and more nimble playing – wow!

**6 – El Viaje (5:13) – starts more quietly and contemplative with solo horn over piano chords; nice singing – choral and solo

7- Mozambique en mi B (3:51) – nice little piano riff to start; horn picks it up, and they play with it

*8- D'una Fabula – (6:20) – starts with horn duet and piano call and response; segues to nice bass and then that fantastic way he tickles the keys and slows to a bit of soft lyrical singing

*9- Inspiracion en Connecticut – (6:05) – begins with pretty arpeggios and background instrumentation, speeds up with nice modulations, adds heft with straight chords and choral singing “Deo”

*10-Oriente – (5:36) – mysteriously lovely at beginning with xylophone type sounds; horns come in; quiet contemplative; singing toward end

11- Improv (Me Voy Pa' Cuba) –(3:22) – live jam session conversation and warmup provide the background outtro to this very worthwhile endeavor.