Lack of salsa music knowledge

C

Cat

New Member
Hi, guys.
I come from a very small salsa scene where we had no contact with live salsa music. Thus being the situation I have no idea about the instruments that are usually used by the band when playing salsa, and even though I read something about it, I cannot identify their sound in a song.

I use to read your posts here at DF and I have to admit, sometimes I have no idea what you are talking about.
My question is what can I do to get a better understanding of what salsa music means in terms of instruments and sound?

Thank you
 
Cat said:
Hi, guys.
I come from a very small salsa scene where we had no contact with live salsa music. Thus being the situation I have no idea about the instruments that are usually used by the band when playing salsa, and even though I read something about it, I cannot identify their sound in a song.

I use to read your posts here at DF and I have to admit, sometimes I have no idea what you are talking about.
My question is what can I do to get a better understanding of what salsa music means in terms of instruments and sound?

Thank you
Click to expand...

Do you have a VCR or DVD player? You could buy a couple salsa concert videos, if you do.

There must be some sort of educational tool that could help you teach yourself this, but I don't know of any offhand.

Are there specific instruments that you are unsure about?

Big band salsa usually has a lot of horns, along the lines of a jazz big band. But it will usually not have a standard drum kit. Instead, you will typically have conga(s), timbales (and cowbell), and bongos. The timbales and cowbell give that hard kind of metalic sound you will here. The conga has a deeper, grounding sort of sound. To me, the bongo sound kind of bubbles up. It's not always obvious (to me anyway) how it fits in with the main rhythm, but it sounds right somehow. And of course, you might also have claves, which are wooden sticks.

Some salsa has more of a country/guajira sort of sound to it. No or fewer horns. You will have a tres or cuatro, which are basically forms of guitar.

Some salsa makes us of charanga orchestration, so you will have violin and flute together, but not much in the way of horns.

Almost all mainstream salsa today will be propduced by a big band, but there are people like Henry Fiol, for example, who work with a more rural small-scale sound. Or you can hear something similar in some of Cuco Valoy's songs like "Mariana Engracia" or "Pa' Gozar Contigo" (spelling from memory, so I might have a mistake or two in there).

The specific distribution of horns is one of the easiest way to recognize different people's styles. A lot of Willie Colon's work (at least from the 70's) emphasizes he trombone sound. In the late 60's, Eddie Palmieri mixed trombone and flute in a way that was adventurous at the time. (I can be fussy about either instrument, but I like what he did with them.) Almost any Willie Rosario song will include a very prominent baritone saxophone (although, lots of other people use that as well).
 
I see you live in Romania. In that case, I have to admit I have little idea of what music you would have been exposed to and what instruments would be familiar.
 
Hi Cat! I've been into the salsa scene(dancing & producing parties) for about 3 years now and I still don't know all the names of the instruments, and cannot distinguish certain obscure types of latin music even considering I have a substantial collection of latin music CDs. I found a site with information on different types of clave, instruments used in latin music and a glossary of latin-related terms if that would be of any interest to you(it's a rather good site!).
www.formedia.ca/rhythms/instrum.html
 
cat, if you come back and respond to out posts here (which I hope you will), I'd be interested in knowing more about what types of music you do typically hear in the part of Romania where you live. Whatever you have to say about it: folk, classical, pop, other. I mention big band jazz as a comparison, but maybe you have no familiarity with it. (It's not exactly hugely popular in the U.S. to begin with.)

I'm pretty interested in music from other countries, but primarily Afro-Latin music (like salsa) and Arabic music (but also, to a lesser extent, Middle Eastern, North African, and Greek music in general).

(In fact, right at the moment I am listening to some Egyptian popular music from the 1940's.)
 
That's so cool, Hothousesalsero, your diverse interest in music. I too am interested in a lot of different kinds of music & have well over 500 CDs, mostly funky stuff I've picked up on my travels. I love Greek music too, especially rembetika. I became fond of it during my visits to Greece and always seek out places offering live music when there. I just LOVE the sound of the bouzouki!
 
cocodrilo said:
That's so cool, Hothousesalsero, your diverse interest in music. I too am interested in a lot of different kinds of music & have well over 500 CDs, mostly funky stuff I've picked up on my travels. I love Greek music too, especially rembetika. I became fond of it during my visits to Greece and always seek out places offering live music when there. I just LOVE the sound of the bouzouki!
Click to expand...

I have about 500 CDs, I think, which isn't that many for someone with my range of musical interests.

I actually was into Greek music before Arabic music, but oddly enough, it was harder to find any clues about it. (In fact, at least on Greek singer is known for covering songs by famous Arabic singers.) I used to listen to a Greek radio show, but when I wrote to the show asking for information on the artists played (it was syndicated and not produced locally), I never heard back from them. I have a short list of Greek singers I want to get to eventually. I don't like that much of the really old rembetika. I like Haris Alexiou--what an incredible voice. Exploring Greek music is kind of on hold though.

In fact, I really feel that I need to get back to salsa dancing right now, and outside of Latin music, I'm more interested in some contemporary avant-garde jazz and "jazztronica." I need music that is going to get my life unstuck again, and salsa/Latin music have worked in the past. And given how much back catalog material I've been discovering, the really current jazz I'm talking about balances that out nicely.
 
Thank you very much for your answers, guys. :notworth:

Where I come from, the music I have most exposed to is classical music (I even played violin for 8 years). I know little about instruments involved in other types of music. In salsa I can hear the clave (both when it plays and when it doesn’t) but I can say little more about the other instruments or musical patterns. :roll:

However, people around here listen a lot to house music and some type of oriental music adapted to Romania. The salsa community as I was saying is very small, and in many cases people that dance salsa do not really know much about salsa as music and would dance basically to anything that has a 4/4 beat and is sang in Spanish.

The site cocodrilo mentioned is extremely interesting and contains lots of information, including examples of the most used patterns. I downloaded them but still have to listen to them a little more to get familiar with.
I will probably come back with some more questions.
 
Well... welcome Cat! I am glad yet another Romanian decided to join DF...

Good question, btw... I have the same problem... and I think the links provided are very useful.

I would also like to have a better understanding of the Salsa music... and it is more difficult for me, as I have no musical background.

Hmmm... maybe the links will help!
 
Cat said:
However, people around here listen a lot to house music and some type of oriental music adapted to Romania. The salsa community as I was saying is very small, and in many cases people that dance salsa do not really know much about salsa as music and would dance basically to anything that has a 4/4 beat and is sang in Spanish
Click to expand...
Most of the people in my semi-nonexistent latin dance community are clueless(as was I when I first started out) as to what's going on musically. Some of the lyrics of that romantic salsa get pretty sappy, I must admit, but I don't really mind if it is something I can dance to! :wink:
 
Thank you brujo, :) those two sites are really interesting. I had a look at them but since I'm in the office now :( the downloading will have to wait a little until I get home.

I think the sites that you mentioned and the one suggested by cocodrilo complement each other beautifully, since one is more technical and the others present the information in a more "user friendly" manner. Also the examples are extremely useful, especially for somebody like me, with very little "practical" experience.

Thank you for your welcome squirrel. :) Nice to know that are some other Romanians interested at developing our small salsa scene.
 
Afro influence

over here (Portugal), and because of our historic links with Africa, salsa in clubs is often intercalated not only with other latin rythms like bachata, merengue, etc..., but also with african music, particularly kizomba or funana. So, for every 4-5 salsas, the DJ here plays 3 kizombas and then returns to salsa. This kind of forces salseros to learn African dance, which is also interesting. But I am curious to know what happens in other countries. Does the local culture influence the type of music that is played in a club apart from salsa?

Tiago
 
The music people usually listen to here, in a disco, is a mixture of salsa, cumbia, merengue, bachata and Latin pop. And in a good night, salsa makes about 40% of the music played.

But I wasn’t referring to this when I talked about people “dancing on anything with a 4/4 beat”. I was referring to people not making the difference most of the time between salsa and Latin pop.

Or maybe I’m just being too demanding. :oops:
 
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