HAVANA JAZZ
REMBER DUARTE & WILLIAM VIVANCO
What genres are mentioned when people discuss music? Classical, rock, rap, dubstep, maybe jazz. The answer also depends on the persons age, but if they truly know music, jazz will always pop up in the conversation. Most musical styles that developed after jazz have some jazz influence.
I remember when my brothers and I were in our early teens growing up in Havana, our parents took us to one of the city’s most popular nightclubs. Of course, it was during the day for a rehearsal, that night our mother was going to be performing with Rember Duarte. Our mother, Leonor Menes Corona, is a painter, not a musician, but she was going to be painting that night at La Zorra y El Cuervo. I was young but still aware of how wonderful Rember’s music was. Our parents always taught us to appreciate good music and his was out of this world. The night my mother painted Rember was playing his sax and William Vivanco was in the audience, apparently, he was playing the next night and wanted to get a feel for the place.
You could walk right by La Cuerva y El Zorro and never even know it was there. Why? Because it’s underground, and its’ entrance looks like one of those typical English phone-booths. Come and see Cuba for yourself and hear the excellent jazz musicians that call my beautiful country home.
By David Hernandez