Rolling Afro-Latin Music 2023: Reggaeton, Salsa,Bachata, Bomba, Latin Jazz, Merengue, Urbano and more Latinx

Barrera, 32, is likely to gather even more trophies on Thursday night, when the 24th annual Latin Grammys are broadcast from Seville, Spain. He is the most-nominated musician this year, with 13 citations including producer and songwriter of the year. In some categories, Barrera is competing against himself. Two songs he co-wrote are nominated for song of the year, while three each are nominated as best tropical song and best regional Mexican song...

...Barrera is also the main songwriter for Grupo Frontera, an accordion-topped, cumbia-based regional Mexican band from his hometown, McAllen, Texas. He heard them playing for a handful of people at the opening of his brother-in-law’s tire shop in 2022. Barrera co-wrote and co-produced Grupo Frontera’s collaboration with Bad Bunny, “Un x100to,” a Top 5 pop single in the United States Barrera grew up in southern Texas, near the Mexican border, and he soaked up both American and Latin American music; his father was in a cumbia band and had a large record collection. Barrera named his own label and publishing company BorderKid because, he told Billboard, “I’m always in the middle.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/15/arts/music/edgar-barrera-latin-grammys.html

Looks like Latin Grammys are happening now in Spain and of course are on tape delay tonight in US. Edgar Barrera won composer of the year

https://x.com/LatinGRAMMYs/status/1725222077689373021?s=20

x-post - Jon Pareles in NY Times on the American Grammys snubs of Latin music acts

Emerging Latin stars get left behind.
After a year in which Latin music continued to explode on streaming services and forge all sorts of cross-cultural hybrids, this year’s Grammy nominations are, well, puzzling. Edgar Barrera, the Mexican American songwriter who has collaborated on hit after hit for singers across the Americas, is rightfully a nominee for songwriter of the year. But there’s no best new artist nomination for Peso Pluma, the cutting-voiced Mexican songwriter whose career skyrocketed in 2022 and 2023 — he’s touring arenas this year — and who bridges regional Mexican corridos and Latin trap. Peso Pluma’s 2023 album, “Génesis,” is just tucked among the nominees for música mexicana. Other emerging Mexican-rooted acts that had a blockbuster year — among them Eslabon Armado, Grupo Frontera, Grupo Firme, Christian Nodal and Natanael Cano — go unmentioned.

Then there’s the oddity of the música urbana category. Its three — only three — nominees are deserving: the reggaeton producer Tainy, the electronics-loving pop experimenter Rauw Alejandro and the Colombian songwriter Karol G, whose 2023 album, “Mañana Será Bonito,” was the first Spanish-language album by a woman to reach No. 1 on the Billboard 200. But música urbana — encompassing reggaeton, Latin hip-hop, dembow, Latin trap and more — is a crowded, competitive, hugely popular format. The Grammys couldn’t find five nominees? All they had to do was turn on the radio. JON PARELES

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/10/arts/music/grammy-awards-snubs-surprises.html

Billboard on Latin Grammys snubs and surprises

https://www.billboard.com/lists/2023-latin-grammy-awards-snubs-surprises/

Rolling Stone on snubs from nominations time in September :

WHEN THE LATIN Grammys announced its nominees last week, the corridos tumbados of Rancho Humilde’s top acts were notably missing from its list. Not a single project from the likes of Fuerza Régida, Natanael Cano, or Junior H made the cut.

https://x.com/RollingStone/status/1706734471783784719?s=20

LA Times also took American Grammys to task for snubbing Mexican regional music

Karol G won a couple of Billboard Music Awards and performed too (in water)

https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/listings/items/grupo-niche-and-hector-acosta-nov-24/

I previewed Colombian salsa greats Grupo Niche gig at MGM National Harbor tonight, but going to be busy with family, so will miss the show. Oh well

dang i would love to see them -- classic!!

Me too.

Listening now to DJ Jim Byers play mambo and boogaloo and stuff on WPFW . Great stuff . He's on to 8 pm ET and his show is archived on the WPFW website.

I didn’t know they still were a going concern.

Grupo Niche have had many membership changes but they're still at it

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/22/theater/buena-vista-social-club-musical-cuban.html

Buena Vista Social Club becomes an off -Broadway musical with actors playing the musicians, the songs in Spanish, and the dialogue in English. Short off-Broadway run at Linda Gross Theater in NY through Jan 7

Buena Vista musical sold out when I am up in NYC area December 14 and 15. Not seeing Old school salsa gigs at Hostos in Bronx on those nights. Need to check Tickeri closer to date also. Maybe Barbes has something

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/this-great-new-book-chronicles-the-indie-blog-era-across-latin-america-and-its-diaspora/

Isabelia Herrera talks to author of new Spanish language book re early 2000s Latin indie

If you are a millennial elder (or viejiennal, as I like to say in Spanish), you might remember a time between the mid 2000s and early ’10s when it felt like music blogs ruled the world. Back then, entire scenes and careers blossomed thanks to websites run by overeager nerds who fawned over artists no one else cared about. This is the largely extinct ecosystem that inspired Testigos del fin del mundo, Javier A. Rodríguez-Camacho’s ambitious survey of the last decade of Ibero-American (or U.S. Latine, Latin American, and Spanish) indie music.

Cool. I don’t know anything about any of that stuff at all.

Jon Pareles in NY Times has Karol G album in his best of 2023 list

And Pareles has Peso Pluma and Kali Uchis in his additional top 20

Just got a copy of Eddie Palmieri's Live at the University of Puerto Rico in the mail. It's a double LP recorded in 1971, while the campus was full of demonstrations and battles between students and cops; it's been edited down to a single CD in the US (and on streaming services) but the whole thing is available as a 2CD set in Japan, so that's what I bought.

Cool to get the full thing

That jazz critics poll always has a separate “Latin” category. But it doesn’t get posted till January I think

*NPR Jazz Piano X-Mas w/ Cuban pianists Melvis Santa, Alfredo Rodriguez, & Hilario Duran @ Kennedy Center tonight Saturday December 2 (pricey ticket)

Anyone know these pianists? I don't . Need to research 'em

I still haven’t googled those Cuban pianists

https://los40.us/2023/top-latin-artists-of-2023-13881.html

X-post re Melvis Santa- she’s a Cuban pianist/singer now based in NY I think, who has a band called the Jazz Orishas

Her bio- Melvis graduated from the prestigious Amadeo Roldan Conservatory in Havana Cuba in 2001 in Piano and Music Education. She has toured and performed extensively with multiple projects as a bandleader, as well as part of other bands, including Kenny Garrett, Chucho Valdes and Irakere, Muñequitos de Matanzas, and Buenavista Social Club. Other special collaborations include Charles Tolliver, Andy Bey, Ravi Coltrane, Arturo O’Farrill and ALJA, David Virelles, Roman Diaz, Xiomara Laugart and others.

Karol G, Peso Pluma, and Bobby Sanabria showing up on a few 2023 best of lists

Come back to this thread please ilxors

Or not

Ha, you rang? Meant to post earlier that I didn’t even know Bobby Sanabria had a new record out recent.

Actually I think Arturo O’Farrill “Fandango at the Wall “ has gotten more attention now that I think about it

I gotta study the Rolling Stone top 50 Spanish language albums of 2023 list when I get a chance

Happy 87th birthday Eddie Palmieri! WPFW dj Jim Byers played some great songs from his first solo album Sunday night on Byers radio show

x-post

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/the-50-best-spanish-language-albums-of-2023-1234922548/

From Tainy’s mind-bending opus Data to Diego Raposo’s brash reinventions on YO NO ERA ASÍ PERO DE AHORA EN ADELANTE, SÍ, some of the most interesting sounds this year embraced innovation head-on. Música mexicana continued to reach global heights with artists like Peso Pluma, Junior H, and Carin Leon plotting new paths. And other acts, among them Francisca Valenzuela, Grupo Frontera, and Karol G found magic by embracing a sense of honesty and intimacy.

Grupo Niche - Sinfonica is the one salsa album on the list

Critic Geoff Himes has Pierrick Pedron and Gonzalo Rubacalba album “Pedron Rubacalba” on top of his jazz album best of list. Maybe it has some Latin tinge ( haven’t heard it)

Pedron Rubacalba is a nice jazz effort but I don’t hear any mambo, salsa, son, Norteno, reggaeton, Latin trap, etc

I need to dig more into that Rolling Stone 2023 list .

The one salsa album on it by Grupo Niche is a good one

Listened to Tainy album Data. It’s instrumental programmed music . Doesn’t wow me, it’s ok

Ha. Dumb me....Data is out both as an instrumental version and one with vocals. Near the end of the one with vocals is Bad Bunny rapping over 80s synths on one cut. This is a little more interesting to me.

https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/best-music-latin-spanish-artists-2023/

Kiko el Crazy y more

Ned S8blette showed the "Omara" film doc tonight that has just been at movie festivals. It's a doc on Cuban singer Omara Portuondo, who came to fame for many via her role in the Buena Vista Social Club. After the screening on Vimeo, Ned had a Q&A with filmmaker Hugo Perez. A knowledgeable interesting guy. Great doc w/ archival footage, plus recent tour footage of her in NY, NJ, Cuba, Mexico City, South Korea . I didn't know she was the daughter of a white Cuban mother and a black Cuban father. Her mother got excommunicated from her well-to-do White family in 1927 for marrying her Dad. Dad was a baseball player and sang at home with Mom and the kids.

Perez has been a consultant on the off-broadway Buena Vista Social Club onstage theatrical musical show in NYC (despite admitting he didn't love the album or tour-- he felt the big large band's playing overwhelmed Omara's singing). He says it may get on Broadway next fall.

RIP Afro-Colombian champeta & cumbia singer accordionist Lisandro Meza who did an awesome take on Fela's song Shakara called "Shacalao"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YESil_YCixQ

https://www.time.com/6548823/best-latin-songs-albums-2023/

Time Magazine critic lists fave Latin pop, dance, and rock

Listened to Mon Laferte again -- like some but not all. She has a range of influences which is good.

Also listened again to Rosalia & ex-fiance Rauw Alejandro ep .

Yeah, I kind of feel the same about Mon Laferte, but what I do like, I really like.

Just saw elsewhere 2 best of 2023 references to Piconema: East African Hits on the Colombian Coast . I haven’t heard it yet and haven’t seen references to it elsewhere here on ILM

It's 2024, time for a new thread

Rolling Afro-Latin Music 2024: Reggaeton, Dembow, Latin Pop, Salsa,Bachata, Bomba, Latin Jazz, Merengue, Urbano and more Latinx