¿Sabes Qué?

Jesse Bermudez, 2001, introducing Puerto Rican music to a new audience

Welcome to ¿Sabes Qué?, AMLA's regular column on the world of Latin music and musicians, from the vantage point of our Philadelphia community. As a regular feature on AMLA's website, I will post articles here on all kinds of issues pertaining to Latino artists and music. I invite your input-- if there are particular artists, genres, questions, comments, or issues that you think need to be voiced, send them to me! If you have a response to or more thoughts about what I write, let us know. Let's get the conversation about the Latin music of the past, present, and future started.

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#2 - June 2009

ABOUT OUR LATIN MUSIC IN PHILADELPHIA

Twenty-six years have passed since the struggles of Latin musicians in the city of Philadelphia to get better working conditions and new venues to play their music resulted in the creation of AMLA.

Together, we made those things come about. But it seems as though twenty-some years brings on much change. Many of the old guard have passed on, and many have retired. We certainly laid the groundwork so that Latin music and Latin musicians would begin to be recognized and respected, and Latin music identified as an important genre in the Philly music scene. There is still a lot to do, like creating a record label that is authentic in the sense that it cares about the development of Latino artists in Philadelphia. Most importantly, we need to have the vision to see that Philadelphia can become the next largest Latin music city outside of New York in this northeastern region.

Salsa, reggaeton, Latin jazz, bachata, merengue, cumbia, charanga, the romantic trio music-we have all these sounds and many more, and if we want to talk about the folkloric music of Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba, not to mention Brazilian and Mexican music and flamenco, we have those also. Philly has all of this and more! Let's not forget that we musicians in Philly were able to create the only school of Latin music outside of Boys' Harbor in New York-we are now in our 22nd year. We have produced numerous young musicians who have won many honors; we have had a two-time Star Search winner, two winners of the Celia Cruz Award out of the N.J. Network competition, and two winners of the Tito Puente Award. Ray Viera, the current singer of the Fania All Stars, groomed by Johnny Pacheco himself, is out of Philadelphia; he also performs with Eddie Palmieri. One of Beyonce's trumpet players in her all-female band, Crystal Torres, was a student and teacher at AMLA. We have had students who graduated from the Berklee School of Music, and some are currently attending- any have gone on to play with local Latin recording groups in the area. In other words, we have done some good things for the music in this city, and for the young people. It's only appropriate for me, with every chance I get, to thank the long list of artists who have taught at AMLA… You know who you are-thanks for helping our young people and nourishing our community! In future, ¿Sabes Qué? will print the list of those who have brought their talents to AMLA.

In this city, all of the major institutions and venues currently present Latin music. So, our mission-to promote the development, dissemination and understanding of Latin music-has been accomplished to a great extent. What we didn't know was that once Latin music got popular, we who were the premiere presenter in the early years would no longer be presenting, unless the production was affiliated with a larger institution. The larger institutions will become the avenues, and have begun to program our music, select our artists for the audiences, and the rest is history. We set out to do something-it happened-we just didn't know what it would mean for our local artists. The new problem is that the major institutions are not booking our local acts, and we are left in the cold after working so hard to get attention for our music and what we do. Well, this really is another topic to write about in the coming months!

Nevertheless, twenty-something years later, we are dealing with new issues, as well as some of the old issues, as the world of Latin music moves on. There are new ways people listen to music, new ways that they obtain the music, new ways of marketing artists, new ways that the music is pirated, new styles of music, and new ways of dancing to it. How do new artists break into the system? The industry is in a transitional period. When larger (mainstream) groups' records sales are declining, then you can imagine what's going on with the smaller genres. There is still not a unified music scene, but maybe that will never happen? Philly is the most unified city for Latin musicians in the country, however. The artists will always need a place and affiliation with some group or organization to be able to look at the future and see how they can prepare for the next transition. That's where we are now, part of a transition that's happening in the industry. What we need to do is to figure out how this transition can benefit us as Latino musicians, based on the outcomes of the record industry.

What I am excited about are new young people who understand the importance of the struggles of Latin musicians and music in this country, and their fellow dancers and visual artists. They understand how we need to continue to fit together so we will always be nourishing each other and our community. We need young people to keep the torch burning and make sure that we don't go backwards. We must take control of our musical destiny in this country.

What we need for the next twenty-year cycle is to find some young people who are going to struggle to maintain avenues of employment for musicians, and to maintain arts and culture alive in their respective Latino communities. We need young people who will make sure that Latin music education is established and maintained in the schools, and who will maintain the musical traditions that have been passed on to them, who will preserve those vibrations as authentically as possible. It will be important to have a business mind that can be successful, with one foot in the commercial scene and the other in the communities. We must make sure we groom our future young artists. The music and the arts must stay alive in our Latino communities; they are what feed the people's spirits.

The call is out to you to become a keeper of our music and our heritage.

"¡Qué Triste Sería Un Pueblo Sin Música!"

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#2 - June 2009

¿Sabes qué…? is a regular column by AMLA Founder and Artistic/Executive Director Jesse Bermudez. Read all about the rich history of Latin music!! Check back soon for the next edition of ¿Sabes qué…? Send a comment, or suggest a topic for ¿Sabes qué…?