Review: The New York Times on CD ‘Tito Puente Masterworks Live!!!’
Bobby Sanabria and the Manhattan School of Music Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra
The repertory movement came slowly to Afro-Latin music, but we’re in the thick of it now. You might know about the projects spearheaded through the last decade by Arturo O’Farrill, with his Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, and by Wynton Marsalis, with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. One that’s still a bit under the radar is the Manhattan School of Music Afro-Cuban Jazz Orchestra, led by the drummer Bobby Sanabria. A new record, “Tito Puente Masterworks Live!!!,” released by Jazzheads, suggests much hope about transmitting the work of bandleaders like Puente through new bands, players and arrangements. In a live set from 2008 the group burns through songs like “Cuban Nightmare,” “Mambo Buddha” and “Ran Kan Kan,” spurred by Mr. Sanabria’s conducting and yelling, and the soloing of student musicians you haven’t heard of yet. You could, of course, just seek out the originals, and you should. But this is something worthy unto itself: a performance that hangs together by a band that’s kicking in the stall.
Ben Ratliff - The New York Times, March 25, 2011
