Savant SCD 2133
Ray Mantilla
The Connection
$13.00
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One would be hard-pressed to name a working jazz musician who has played with a longer list of great artists than Ray Mantilla. Beginning his career in the 1950s with Latin music greats such as Xavier Cugat and Monguito Conjunto, Ray has played with such wildly diverse personalities as Eartha Kitt, Freddie Hubbard, Larry Coryell, Morgana King, Gato Barbieri, Cedar Walton, Michael Urbaniak, Kenny Burrell, Shirley Scott and countless others. Together with Max Roach, he was a founding member of the popular percussion ensemble M'Boom. Here on The Connection, Mantilla has taken his decades of experience in music and synthesized it into a language which encompasses the best of all genres while never quite leaving his Latin roots and heritage. With a band made up of long-time colleagues Ray rips through an imaginative program of originals and standards where the Latin beats are tinged with echoes of Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Spain and Ray's own Nuyorican roots. Here is a lesson in Latin music from the man who perhaps knows it best, having helped define its evolution during the course of his remarkable career: Ray Mantilla.
RAY MANTILLA, percussion • Willie Williams, soprano • tenor saxophone • Enrique Fernández, baritone saxophone • flute • Guido Gonzalez, trumpet • Edy Martinez, piano • Cucho Martinez, bass • Bill Elder, drums
TRACKS: Andean Fantasy • Los Apocalypticanos • The Simple Life • Psalm 107 • El Carnivalito • Homanaje a San Rafael • Pieces • New Moon • Soñando Puerto Rico • Blues for Ray
