Plena Libre, hot and spicy

Latin Beat Magazine, Sept, 2003 by Silvio H. Alava

Plena Libre is one of only a few groups who play Puerto Rico's traditional rhythms. Performing music that emerged from Puerto Rico's African heritage, Plena Libre uses percussion, trombones and vocals to produce joyous dance music through exciting arrangements. They played the Henderson Pavilion in Nevada in mid-June and left a small but happy audience crying "¡Otra!, ¡Otra!, ¡Otra!"

Before the concert, I went backstage to meet the group of twelve men and one woman. While speaking to their leader, bassist, composer, arranger and producer Gary Nuñez, I mentioned that unfortunately, the audience for their concert would be sparse. He answered in a very philosophical manner by telling me of an experience they had in Argentina: "We played to an audience of five, and out of that concert, two of those individuals in attendance got us two jobs in Florida before audiences that were in the thousands. You never know whom you are playing to. We give everything we've got, no matter what the size of the audience is."

That night, in a concert hall just south of Las Vegas, Plena Libre did just that; they injected a small audience with large amounts of excitement, power and energy. With three trombones providing salient licks throughout, the rhythm section was the star of the evening. Gina Villanueva, on congas, demonstrated marvelous control by always supporting the other musicians and never overplaying. It was obvious that this lady has chops, and the audience reacted accordingly when she made tasty phrases on her drums. The singers also were the front line of pandereteros, playing a single-headed, hand-held drum covered with goatskin. The seguidor, punteador and requinto players demonstrated the intricacy of the plena rhythm. If you shut your eyes and didn't look at the stage, the requinto player sounded as if he were soloing on a conga drum. These three drummers and the güícharo (gourd scraper) player alternated in singing the compositions played throughout the concert. This is definitely a group that has to be seen more than once to appreciate the depth of its collective talent.