Montuno Groove

[stoptime]

Hey all, does anybody know how to play a Montuno on the set? If so, could you write it out :)

Cheers!

[Garvin]

Montuno isn't a specific groove, it just refers to the part of a song. Kind of like the chorus. You might just want to play cascara and clave or bongo bell and clave during the montuno section.

[stoptime]

Thanks for the info!

[drumbum24]

Hey Stoptime,

Montuno....great stuff to play. This is the best part of a salsa tune, in my opinion. Everyone is focused on the melody/chorus call and response. The bonga bell=1+3, cascara beat from the timbales to cowbell, conga player more direct with pattern, etc....

Check out Bobby Sonabria(sp?) with Mario Bauza's Group, Dave Weckl with Chick Corea, Steve Gadd, Robbie Ameen with Ruben Blades, too many to list. Hope all goes well. Take it easy, man.

[Garvin]

Hey,

I just checked out some of your tunes on the Electronic Press Kit and got a feeling for your sound. You guys are great. I think in the context of your music, you might just want a sort of latinesque type thing. I will make a video if I can of something that I think you might want to try, and I'm sure something you already do maybe without realizing it.

I really dig your band and your feel on the kit is great. Very well done site as well. Do you guys gig outside of the city?

[Guillermo]

As it is so common to happen with afrocaribbean rythms things get distorted inpublic perception... as what happened with "Mambo" which suddenly became a "Musical style" in 1950's New York.

Montuno, is a derivative of Son.

Son is a musical style, original from Cuba, as you know... Son Montuno is a softer, slower style of son... different from the style from the city, which was danced in a more formal, vertical way... Montuno was a more relaxed, sort of COUNTRY version.

So let's say Son is rock, Montuno would be Country.

Montuno BY ITSELF is not a rythm... when a latin musician say this has "a montuno vibe" or "This is a montuno", it's like saying "This is Thrash"... you don't NEED to say "Thrash metal"... it is SON.

Good examples are Beny Moré (El bárbaro del ritmo) although most RECORDED examples are a rather produced and arranged, more slick version of the real thing... the real thing has NO BRASS... it's basicly Guiro, Bongo, Flute, Guitar.

A great example is "La familia andré" from my country.

[Garvin]

Good post Guillermo!

[stoptime]

Thanks guys! I'd love to see/hear anything you can provide - latin is certainly one of my weak links.

@ Gavin - I'm actually posting this from Madison, we just did the city's Jazz at Five series. We do get out of Chicago sometimes, and now that our lineup is more solid, I hope to be doing it more. The gig list on the site hasn't been updated in awhile - need to fix that ;)

Cheers all.

[Garvin]

Here's a quick video I made of some stuff I go to during tunes with a montuno-ish section in a jazz setting. If you listen to this with headphones or good speakers, you'll hear one of those cheesy garageband basslines looping in the background. I just kind of played along with that.

The initial clip is me just playing a few of the basic feels, or patterns on the rims. Over the next couple of clips I move them around the kit a little and kind of slop my way through some lazy little fills.

This is just sort of an amalgamation of a bunch of real rhythms that use cascara, clave, mambo and bongo bell as well as I think some sort of New Orleans type stuff and a couple sections where I go into straight 4/4 jazz stuff. Wow, it looks a lot better in writing than on video, but thats what was goin' on in my head as I played and edited it. Oh, a glaring error that I am absolutely aware of is that I'm placing the bombo (bass drum) hit in the wrong place, but I kind of do that on purpose when I mess around with jazzier stuff because it makes the transitions easier (for me). This is a bad habit though that hurts me when I play timbales, because that bombo is so important.

Hope this helps a little!

G

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YM9VlP9pS0

[Garvin]

Here's something much better from John Favicchia http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHPnUEC23rA this is much more traditional afro-cuban. Really great comping while staying out of the way of the soloist. Clean sounding, very nice...

[stoptime]

Awesome! You sound great, and that's really going to help me. Good tip on the garage band loop too.