(note: Originally written 12/13/2010)
What would Arsenio, Cachao or Lecuona Think of today's Latin jazz? Would they be welcoming the growing global phenomena of la musica while at the same time supportive of the jazz contribution that distributed it worldwide? Ever protective of Afro-Cubanidad, Arsenio cried, "Iese maldito mambo!"
According to Bohemia Magazine in 1952, Cachao was slow to embrace Latin jazz and I doubt Lecuona would have embraced it any faster. But times and tastes change us all. "I once was blind..." Gone is my Latin Jazz criticism. Discarded is my fear of any calamitous consequences supposedly involved in the merger of Latin and jazz. Perhaps I lacked the secret teaching, the "disciplina arcana" essential for such an unpopular undertaking’s success. All music is musica sacra. It is commercial materialistic greed that befouls all.
The drums have spoken and I have taken this proper moment that the ancient Romans called punctum temporis, to surrender to better sense. Las dos alas de Latin Jazz make better bedfellows than my malingering, my belittling the evident advantages of a union that benefits both houses like a royal marriage.
All this does not change my duty. I was assigned a mission back in Regla in 1941 to promote and protect Afro Cuban music around the world. One can become popular by becoming unpopular. But as Charles Baudelaire (paraphrased) said, "Latin ou jazz, qu' importe?" Good or bad, the ardent masses on our dance floors prove it. This music within itself dispels counter-productive differences that tend to exist among mankind naturally. Viva la musica!
