The past two weeks to have been more musically fulfilling to me than I could possibly have wished for. I think that's a testament to our philosophy of 'friends in a workshop' approach.
When we set out a fortnight ago, I felt that one of the primary milestones was being able to play in a way that distinguished between son and son montuno. Yesterday we took a very big step forward with El carretero as a context thanks to Jeremy playing either the guajeo or cinquillo-arpeggiated pattern on tres, myself interpreting the latter on guitar, and Jan playing tresillo on violin (Catie's been away surveying the environment 'down South'). And the real mark of progress was how we could begin to flavour the music for white or black consumption, simply with some minor variations like muted notes and changes in phrasing.
The realisation of years of accumulated theory in a moment of practice is an experience I still today, 24 hours later, feel very grateful for.
The immediate plan is for us to continue along the same vein. We'll be working on the same rhythms but additionally start exploring variations and what they mean for the listener; start developing interaction using rhythm hand-over exercises; and explore changing the rhythm balance in ensemble. I intend to build for us a bomb-proof rhythm foundation that the great Cuban ensembles have.
True to my predictions, although much sooner than I expected, I'm under pressure to improve my guitar work just to stay ahead of the others - which is exactly what I was needing. And they guys asked me, "why Laloma?" It's a play on words from the very famous son called 'son de la loma', where the lead singer asks where the best son singers are from; and the response is that they're from la loma [literally 'hillock', but specifically a region in Cuba]. I think we're committed to playing that number.
Loo Yeo
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