Search - Spanish Harlem Orchestra, Ruben Blades :: Across 110th Street

Salsa dura

Karin Norgard | Anchorage, Alaska, USA | 03/20/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This CD won the Grammy award in 2005 for Best Salsa/Merengue Album. It is a great CD full of salsa dura, with a few cha-cha-chas thrown in. All the tracks are danceable, with a variety of tempos and plenty of stimulating call and response from the brass and vocals. This CD has hotter tracks and an even greater "big band" feel than the Spanish Harlem Orchestra's previous album, "Un Gran Dia en el Barrio." "Maestro de Rumbero," became a fast favorite, but there are many other songs that I still enjoy listening to. If you enjoy salsa dura and Latin jazz, you will love this CD; however, I have found that fans of smoother and more romantic salsa tend not to like this music very much. If you enjoy this album, check out Spanish Harlem Orchestra's newest release, United We Swing, as well as La Excelencia's Salsa con Conciencia."

Hot Hot Hot: It Channels the Exuberance of Salsa in Its Heyd

Stephanie DePue | Carolina Beach, NC USA | 12/20/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Across 110th St.,' by the thirteen member Spanish Harlem Orchestra, was a highly deserving Grammy winner for Best Salsa, as it gives us infectious new versions of the decades of Nuyorican's (New York's Puerto Rican, and, by extension, Latin population) favored "salsa dura" (hard salsa). The orchestra that was founded in 2000 by Aaron Luis Levinson, and salsa legend Oscar Hernandez, received a Grammy nomination for its debut album,Un Gran Dia en el Barriothey were also named Best New Artist of 2003 by the Billboard Latin Music Awards.



Their new versions of old songs celebrate the rich, intertwining cultures of New York's Latino communities, and are dedicated to preserving the vital history of classic Latin music while bearing in mind the tastes of today's dancers. Aside from the somewhat weak bolero "Esperame En El Cielo," there isn't a loser in the bunch. Heavy brass leads the sound: two trumpets, two trombones, and a baritone saxophone. Add in conga, bonga, timbale players, and, for percussion, upright bass, and an acoustic piano. The rhythms are Afro-Cuban, the horns are hard-riffing, the piano is rippling, and the vocals, ah: delivered by Ruben Blades, winner of four Grammies, and such other experienced hands as Ray De La Paz and Marco Bermudez. World class soloist Jimmie Bosch is on that lead trombone. I have seen the Spanish Harlem Orchestra perform with Bosch, and the music is simply electrifying: even the dead would find it hard to resist. You could say it channels the exuberance of 1960's-`70's salsa in its heyday; the energy and spirit of El Barrio. This is hot, hot hot exploding music that does its makers proud.

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