Remembering The Corso

Latin Beat Magazine, Sept, 2000 by Max Salazar

On May 1, 1966, the mecca of New York City's mambo dancers, the Palladium Ballroom, closed its doors for the last time. The new "in place" became The Chez José, located at the Hotel Park Plaza, 50 West 77th Street between 8th and Columbus Avenue.

The black double door entrance at street level had a stairway which led down to the posh club. It opened for business on a Friday evening in mid-1965 with the Larry Harlow orchestra. Even though there was no advertising, the club attracted a huge following. There was no marquee with the names of the featured bands. Dancers never knew who was going to perform until they entered the ballroom.

Between 1965 and 1970, New York's elite salsa, charanga and boogaloo orchestras performed their swinging music, attracting elegantly dressed beautiful people who danced till the wee hours of the morning.

In 1970, when the Chez closed, the new "in place" became the Corso Ballroom, located at 205 East 86th Street, off the corner of 3rd Avenue. The night club, which opened for business in 1927, was always a restaurant until after World War II and catered to the predominately German speaking residents who lived in the immediate area. Up until May, 1968, when Tony Raimone became the proprietor, the Corso featured "Continental Music," (music of Europe). Raimone was a frequent customer at the Corso for fourteen years before he decided to buy the restaurant. He opened for business in May, 1968 and featured the Glenn Miller Orchestra led by Buddy DeFranco and was followed by Lionel Hampton's band with poor results.

One evening, Pete Bonet, a vocalist born in Santurce, Puerto Rico, persuaded the owner to let him promote a Latin music night. Bonet, who at the time had a hot selling record called Soul Drummer with Ray Barretto's orchestra, hired the Barretto band and filled every square inch of the club. Bonet and brother Julio booked the bands and filled the club every Wednesday through Sunday evenings with popular bands such as Tito Puente, Machito, Orquesta Broadway, Eddie Palmieri, Johnny Pacheco, Típica Novel, José Fajardo and La Sonora Matancera.

The Wednesday night crowd was treated to special shows where the dancing skills of Cuban Pete, Mike Vásquez, Freddie Rios, Carlos Arroyo and Mike Ramos, among other widely-known dancers, thrilled the spectators with the latest dance crazes and steps.

On August 2, 1968, the 12-man Pete Bonet Orchestra under the musical directorship of Louie Ramírez, made its club debut and overwhelmed the dancers with original Ramírez compositions and arrangements which reminded me of the Tito Puente sound (listen to the albums The Odds are On Pete Bonet (Swinger, 1968) and Pete and Louie, The Beautiful People (Fania, 1969).

The Bonet brothers were on a roll so they went Latin on Monday nights, drawing aficionados away from Latin jazz shows at the Village Gate. Contributing to the popularity of the Corso was one of the ads in the then newly founded Latin New York Magazine:

THE CORSO THE HOME OF THE TYPICAL SOUND

"Ever feel blue...lonely, and don't know what to do? Want to meet a beautiful doll and dance to music that will arouse the both of you? If your answer is yes, visit the Corso any Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday evenings. No matter what your problem is, once you pass through the portals to the entrance of the Corso, the typical music will infect you and enable you to escape from your problems for a few hours. There is never a typical evening at the Home of the Typical Sound. There are the orchestras of Tito Puente, Orquesta Broadway, Eddie Palmieri, Louie Ramírez, Ray Barretto, Johnny Pacheco, Larry Harlow, Willie Colón, Machito and many more, whose music is played in their unique typical arrangements intended to infect you with the good feeling of joy. Something different is always happening. Someone is always getting infected. One of the most infectious nights at the Corso occurred on August 2, 1969, when Larry Harlow's orchestra thrilled the wall-to-wall dancers with an arousing rendition of the tune Jovenes Del Muelle. The dancers were in a state of euphoria. Lew Kahn was riffing on trombone... bassist Lydio Fuentes contributed to the mania, vocalist Ismael Miranda emitted arousing ad-libs while a chorus sang Amaila Llegó a las Nubes.

"The capacity crowd on Mother's Day, May 13, 1973, was infected by the typical music of Orquesta Broadway, Ray Barretto, and Johnny Pacheco. Eddy Zervigón, flutist and director of Orquesta Broadway, thrilled the dancers with an arousing sounding Pa Africa from their most recent recording. Try to imagine his rapidly moving fingers on a black wooden flute blowing a minor chord in a low register and then rising above three octaves every other note. Try to picture sweat beads dripping from the nose of Ray Barretto while he sings coro and his hands thump the skins of his drums and his band is infecting the dancers with their latest swinging arrangement of La Familia. Can you see Johnny Pacheco suffering with a head cold, unable to sing and asking a sensuous 5' 5" shapely Latin doe-eyed doll singing coro in his place because his sore throat did not permit him to reach the high notes? No...don't try to imagine it...see and hear it at the Home of the Typical Sound. Drop by the Corso. . .and get infected." --Max Salazar