The LIFE and MIRACLES of PAQUITO D'RIVERA

Latin Beat Magazine, Dec, 1998 by Luis Tamargo

Being the son of the Havanese representative of Selmer instruments (a classical tenor player called Tito Rivera, known to practice 26 hours a day), Francisco Jesús Rivera Figueras --better known as Paquito D'Rivera-- developed his self-proclaimed "homosaxual" tendencies at a very young age.

In 1957, at the age of 9, the soprano sax prodigy was contracted to perform for a few weeks in Santo Domingo, known at that time as Trujillo City in homage to the ruling dictator Rafael Trujillo, a.k.a. "Chapitas" (an unofficial nickname possibly derived from the numerous small, thin metal plates designed to adorn said jabao general's anachronistic uniform). Paquito then traveled to Puerto Rico, where he was featured at San Juan's Normandie Casino, not to be confused with the lesser known, eponymous gambling establishment in Gardena, the L.A. suburb which gave birth to LATIN BEAT.

The elder saxophonist was so committed to his son's musical education that he even rook up the clarinet in order to teach Paquito how to play such difficult instrument. Tito Rivera's pedagogical efforts were quite fruitful. In 1958, Paquito was seen performing the Weber Clarinet Concerto No. 2 at Havana's Teatro Nacional, under the historic baton of the maestro Gonzalo Roig.

A couple of years later, he entered Marianao's Cartula Conservatory, where he studied clarinet, composition, and harmony. That same year, Paquito fulfilled his vehement desire to travel to New York, where he was booked at the Teatro Puerto Rico by Catalino Rolón, a promoter who was known to carry a bag of money and a 45-caliber revolver in his trunk. Por si las moscas. "For if the flies" is the literal translation of this Spanish phrase, despite its actual meaning: "Just in case."

Upon his return to Cuba, Paquito got his first steady, well-paid gig with the all-star house band of Havana's Teatro Musical. At the age of 15, he was already playing alongside the top musicians in the Cuban capital. He also participated in the first recordings of a seminal combo led by Jesús "Chucho" Valdés, a young pianist who would become the greatest influence in Paquito's career.

In 1967, after spending some unhappy years in what he describes as "the longest compulsory military service in this planet", D'Rivera was authorized to become the lead alto soloist of the Orquesta Cubana de Música Moderna (OCMM), an all-star big band initially led by Armando Romeu, one of the first jazz saxophonists in Cuba's musical history. Although the OCMM included many of the island's best musicians, it was soom reduced to a backup orchestra for singers, despite the objections of D'Rivera, who ended up conducting the ill-fated band for a couple of years.

D'Rivera's career took a drastic turn for the better in 1973, when he became one of the cofounders of Irakere, the most important Latin jazz group (or the most important Latin American group, period) of the 20th Century. D'Rivera played baritone in Irakere's Bacalao Con Pan, the group's first recording. This innovative batúm-batá radically changed the stylistic course of Cuban popular music.

Nevertheless, D'Rivera had grown increasingly unhappy with the Cuban regime's cultural intolerance and political repression. He eventually decided to bid farewell to Fidel Castro, a.k.a. "Bola De Churre" (or Dirt Ball, an unofficial nickname based on his alleged body odor). In May of 1980, during a European tour with Irakere, D'Rivera obtained political asylum at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid. A few months later, the jazz world's first major defector from Castro's Cuba landed in New York City.

The rest is history. D'Rivera revolutionized the U.S. Latin jazz scene of the 1980s. He became the only U.S. based Latin musician who was "playing real Latin jazz", according to the late Mario Bauzá, a founding father of said multicultural genre. Even more significant is the fact that his generous nature as a bandleader launched the solo careers of many talented cohorts, such as Jorge Dalto, Claudio Roditi, Michel Camilo, Mario Rivera, Daniel Ponce, Giovanni Hidalgo, Danilo Pérez, David Sánchez, and Fareed Haque.

A mutual friend and fellow shipwreck survivor, Sergio García-Marruz, summarized the artistic and human essence of Paquito D'Rivera as follows: "We cannot remain the same after knowing Paquito. And when God eventually has the pleasure to get to know him as well as we do, he will not be able to take him so lightly because, as we well know, Paco is devilishly mischievous."

Produced and arranged by Bob Belden, the CD Paquito D'Rivera with Strings - 100 Years of Latin Love Songs (Heads Up) provides a refreshing outline of a whole century of sensual ballads and romantic dance tunes from different sources (tango, vallenato, bolero, bossa nova, etc.) Over half of the tracks were recorded with a full string orchestra, and the entire repertoire features diverse formations of D'Rivera's regular cohorts, including such talented musicians as Dario Eskenazi, Oscar Stagñaro, Fareed Haque, Mark Walker and Luis Conte. Half of the material highlights the Cuban bandleader's wizardry on clarinet and alto sax, while the other half showcases his equally dazzling command of the soprano sax. In a change of stylistic pace, D'Rivera steps beyond the confines of Latin jazz to illustrate a historically accurate review of Latin America's romantic songbook.