Los soneros del barrio: the real deal

Latin Beat Magazine, June-July, 2003 by Rudy Mangual

For the past couple of years, the New York City band "Los Soneros Del Barrio" has been brewing a special blend of old-school classic salsa music with the aid of today's modern technological advances and the talent of some of the top players in the business. The results are in, and their music is the real thing; "salsa dura," the real deal that will never die. Following is an insight into one of the founding members of this popular band, and one of its newer members.

Born in Salinas, Puerto Rico, Frankie Vázquez and his family relocated to New York City when he was six months old. Around his 10th birthday, his father bought a conga drum from a neighbor and placed it in Vázquez's room. Every day after school, the young Vázquez would bang on the drum to the music of his mother's records (El Gran Combo, Cortijo and Eddie Palmieri), and consequently became good at it. By his 12th birthday, his father acquired a second conga to further bolster his son's musical talent. Soon after, his parents sent him back to Puerto Rico to live with his grandparents in the city of Guayama, where years later, they also relocated.

In Guayama, Vázquez completed his academic education and started playing the conga with local salsa and merengue bands. By age 16, he had formed his own band and was playing at his father's bar/restaurant in Guayama every weekend. He continued playing his preferred instrument without much consideration of singing, beyond doing a chorus here and there. After about a year of bandleading, his lead singer started to forego rehearsals and eventually left the band. Necessity being the mother of invention, Vázquez began leading the vocals during rehearsals of his band, who kindly informed him that he was a better singer than a conguero; they also felt that it was easier to find a conga player than a singer. From that point on, Vázquez became the band's lead singer and has continued to make a career as a vocalist ever since. Subsequently, he went on to form two other bands in Guayama: Frankie Vázquez & Los Generales and Frankie Vázquez & La Compacta.

During Carlos Santana's early Latin rock days, Vázquez organized a grooving band called La Soul Latina with the aid of his cousin David Sánchez, who played electric guitar. In February of 1977, Sánchez decided to return to New York City and months later convinced Vázquez to follow him. Through Sánchez's recommendation, Vázquez got an audition with and was hired by a Brooklyn band called Fuego 77 (led by pianist Marcos Fernández and Noy Matos). Fuego 77, produced by Al Santiago, was his first recording. A year later, he joined the New Swing Sextet band with whom he worked on and off for 15 years. Vázquez sang with many New York bands throughout his career, such as Charansón, Orquesta Calidad, Sonido Taibori, Típica Novel, Louie Sánchez y Las Siete Potencias, Wayne Gorbea, Javier Vázquez y La Sonora, Sonora Matancera, The Lebrón Brothers, Conjunto Libre and Jimmy Bosch. David Sánchez is still an integral part of Vázquez's musical career as he currently sings chorus with Los Soneros Del Barrio.

The following is a recent brief chat with Frankie Vázquez.

Rudy Mangual: How did Los Soneros Del Barrio evolve?

Frankie Vázquez: The late Martín Arroyo and John Benítez were the architects of Los Soneros Del Barrio. While I was on a tour in Europe with the Jimmy Bosch band, Richie Bastal (the son of Kako, now with El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico) was also on the tour and kept playing a demo tape of two tracks he had recorded with Martín Arroyo and this new band from New York. I had been hesitant about working with Arroyo prior to this, but after returning to New York Bastal invited me to the studio to do some mataca tracks and hang out. So I went to the studio and found Ray Castro vocal-coaching Martín Arroyo on some scratch vocal tracks for this new recording and it sounded terrible. Arroyo is a piano player, not a singer. The bottom line is that I eventually ended up doing the tracks and everyone loved them. They had planned the whole thing with me in mind. Before leaving the studio that day, Arroyo told Castro to convince me to do all the vocal tracks because they did not have a lead singer and they felt I was right for the job. Arroyo and bassist John Benítez had previously selected most of the material and created all the charts for the new production, but were recruiting the players as they went along. That was the way Arroyo operated. Sadly, soon after completing the first Soneros album, Arroyo passed away from cardiac arrest.

RM: Was it at that time that you acquired the band?

FV: Yes, the band members and Arroyo's daughters wanted me to keep the band going because it was a good group and worth continuing. So I basically had to start all over again because Arroyo was gone and so were Castro and the rest of the guys that produced the first album. With the help of Carlos Ortiz and Oscar Poche from Rumba Jam Records, in partnership with Amario Santos, we were able to record the band's second album, Remembranzas. The musicians recorded for almost nothing, for the love of the project and for the music.