The New York Times calls Cuban pianist, composer and seven-time Grammy winner Chucho Valdés, “A pianist of imperial command, possessed of a dazzling, deceptively casual virtuosity,” and refers to Trinidadian trumpeter and composer Etienne Charles as “an auteur.”
These two important Caribbean musicians will perform for the première event of HADCO Experiences’ entrée into the premium event space with A Creole Christmas Gift: Concert and Cocktails on December 16 at the National Academy for the Performing Arts (NAPA), Frederick Street, Port of Spain.
Those international accolades from the New York Times have a bearing on what audiences can and will see and hear at the concert, as do the keen observations of Charles, a media release said.
[caption id="attachment_1047355" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Chucho Valdez - AP Photo[/caption]
Charles spoke recently of the show, and the importance of the headliner, Valdés, to the event and to the Caribbean. “I think, one, it’s special, and two, it’s kind of a once-in-a-lifetime event for TT to have an artist of this magnitude in what I would say is such an intimate setting, " he said in the release.
“Chucho Valdés is probably one of the most influential, not only musicians, but composers and recording artists of the 21st century, and the 20th century. He possesses a vast knowledge of not just the piano, but composition and music, as well as spirituality. To have him on our shores for a concert is special!”
Charles explained that “a big part of what I see as the Caribbean artistic aesthetic is about clarity, and when I think of Chucho Valdés, I think about clarity. I think of his ideas being expressed musically without any stumbles. I think of his body of work as having huge impact in terms of where he is taking his music, what he has been an ambassador for. I mean, he has been an ambassador for jazz, an ambassador for Cuba, an ambassador for the Caribbean, an ambassador for black people, an ambassador for the Orishas.
[caption id="attachment_1047372" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Jazz singer Vaughnette Bigford -[/caption]
"There are so any different ways that he represents, and at the end of the day, it’s always with the highest level of artistry and the highest levels of diplomacy. He is able to use music as a tool to communicate peace, and to communicate how music is supposed to energise people and keep us together in civilised ways.”
The importance of Valdés can not be underestimated nor undervalued. He is a colossus in the Caribbean jazz community. Charles was fortunate to tour with this icon and his big band in the last several months through Europe and into North America, where they performed to sold-out audiences by the thousands at concert spaces there, the release said.
Charles continued his observations by noting that “it’s always incredible to see Chucho’s reach. It’s refreshing also, as a Caribbean man, to see the possibilities of global acceptance of Caribbean music when it is, one, presented correctly, and two, when there is an opportunity
