A bite from the apple—New York

Latin Beat Magazine, Feb, 2003 by Vicki Sola

Adela Dalto, who has just unveiled her third release, La Creme Latina, is a well-known and respected entity in the Apple's musical community and beyond, but few know her story.

Born in southern Texas and raised in Indiana, the vocalist grew up listening to a wide array of musical styles--recordings of Toña La Negra, Celia Cruz, and El Gran Combo--that her Mexican father played, Mexican music that her Texan, part-Indian mother listened to on the radio, and the soul, R&B, and Motown hits of the day.

After her graduation from high school in Gary, Indiana, where she sang, learned to read music and play the violin, Dalto began working in Chicago, where she met the man who was to become her husband, pianist Jorge Dalto.

"I was 19 at the time," she told journalist Louis Laffitte. "He told me he was from Argentina. I didn't know where Argentina was, I had to go home and look on the map. It was quite exotic for me. He introduced me to a lot of music. I hadn't heard too much jazz or salsa. He was working at one of the nicest nightclubs in Chicago, and we would go there to dance. I explored his record collection, and I came across Hubert Laws, so I thought I'd like to take flute lessons, because it's the same key that you would read for the violin." Laughing, Dalto added, "I realized it was going to take a lot of practicing, so I decided that I wasn't going to be a musician."

Meanwhile, Jorge Dalto himself had noticed that Adela, who had been an alto voice since she began singing in her fourth grade choir, knew the lyrics to many songs. Some of his singer friends invited Adela to practice with them. She had grown impatient, sitting on the sidelines with wives of other musicians, just watching Jorge's band perform.

In 1975, two years after they met, the couple moved to New York with the goal of networking with Gato Barbieri. Jorge, who had landed a job quickly, ended up recording, two months later, on Barbieri's album Yesterdays, filling in for Eddy Martínez.

"It was powerful music," said Adela. "While he [Jorge] traveled, I took lessons. My music teacher was maestro Alberto Socarrás. I would be going up the stairs and Néstor Torres would be coming down. Socarrás would do your lesson in ten minutes and then tell stories of the magic flute, how he was the first, before Mario Bauzá, to play at the Apollo Theater. (Laughter)"

Jorge Dalto was soon recording jingles for Chico O'Farrill, and Adela credits O'Farrill for her involvement in that business. She joined the union and recorded three or four commercials every month for several years. She also began singing in restaurants. "There weren't that many Brazilian singers in town,' she recalled. "I didn't speak Portuguese then. I learned songs Brazilian bands tend to always have a girl sing, such as The Girl from Ipanema."

In 1980, Jorge started his own group, and Adela, who had also been singing some Latin jazz numbers, was featured on Ease My Pain, a composition written by Jorge, Adela, and Sybil Thomas, on Jorge Dalto & the Inter-American Band's Urban Oasis (1985, Concord Picante).

In 1987, Jorge died, and Adela found herself taking her music much more seriously; she had two sons to support. A year later she went to work on her first recording, A Brazilian Affair. She composed half of that album, released in 1995. In 1989, Dalto received a call from the late Mauricio Smith to work with him at the famed Rainbow Room.

"I went to the Mauricio Smith school of music," she told Laffitte. "When I got there, Virgilio Martí was singing and playing the conga. It was solid. I started to sing Latin at the Rainbow Room. The gig was five nights a week, four sets, plenty of singing and learning the Latin standard repertoire." She performed there until around 1992.

When Graciela and Mario Bauzá's physician Dr. Manuel Sanchez Acosta, recommended that Graciela not accompany Bauzá on an impending three-week tour of Europe, Dalto got the job. She will never forget learning Graciela's number Deja Que Diga La Gente, and sharing the stage with luminaries Freddie Hubbard and Cab Calloway.

By 1995, Dalto began pulling away from Brazilian music and moved towards her Latin side. That summer, Todd Barkin and Aloiso Agular produced her recording Papa Boca, whose title track was composed by Dr. Manuel Sánchez Acosta. On this CD, in addition to using some of the same musicians who played on her first album, she featured Gilberto Colón, Jr., Milton Cardona and Yomo Toro. The production, released on the Fantasy label, "got lost in the shuffle."

On May 12, 2002, Dalto produced "A Mother's Day Tribute to Toña La Negra" at Aaron Davis Hall in New York City. The idea had been born three years earlier, when Dalto's father had asked her when she was going to do something for Mexico.

The much acclaimed concert starred Dalto, conductor Francisco Zumaque, and featured guests Graciela, Steve Turre, Mario Rivera, Rolando Briceno, and Dave Valentín. "I needed someone who had confidence in me and would dedicate the time to learn the music," stated the singer. "There were 22 strings. I needed someone sharp and experienced. Francisco Zumaque was moving to New York from Colombia, and called. Bingo!"