Al Santiago

b. Albert Santiago, 1932, Spanish Harlem, Manhattan, NEW YORK, NY, USA, of Puerto Rican parentage. Pianist, saxophonist, composer, arranger, music group head, conductor, record manufacturer, Latin retail record shop owner/supervisor, Latin record label creator and employer, Santiago, represents himself as ‘an extrovert of manic proportions, an over-achiever, pioneer, catalyst and innovator’. Santiago was created right into a musical family members. His dad was a specialist musician who performed violin, saxophones, clarinet and trombone with different Latin dance rings and his uncle led a Latin big music group. His old sister researched piano with a lady professional musician who done the brand new York Latin picture and sometimes performed within the same music group as his dad. Santiago started piano tuition using the same instructor in the first 40s, but didn’t try the device. ‘I disliked piano a lot that I utilized to play ‘The Minute Waltz’ in 30 secs so I could easily get out to play softball’, he afterwards joked. He made a decision to change to saxophone, which he discovered easier to enjoy. Santiago became the band-boy for his uncle’s big music group. When he was 15 yrs . old, his uncle informed him to dominate his tenor saxophone seat. In 1950, Santiago’s uncle quit music group leading to open up the Casa Latina, which became among New York’s leading Latin record shops. He handed his orchestra to the 18-year-old Santiago, who discovered himself encircled by ‘previous men’ within their thirties and forties, including his dad on saxophone. Santiago steadily introduced new youthful personnel, in order that ultimately only his dad remained as a genuine member. He known as the music group the Chack-a-nunu Young boys. ‘Chack-a-nunu’ was his attempt at a verbal interpretation from the sound created by a Latin tempo section playing only. Between 1948 and 1960, Santiago also performed with Carlos Pizarro, Un Combo Ponce, Jack port Portalatin, Quique Monsanto and Pepi LaSalle. He also sat-in with several other orchestras including Machito and Tito Puente. An excellent admirer of Buck Clayton, when Santiago was about 19 yrs . old, an incident relating to the jazz trumpeter/arranger happened that became a significant turning stage in his existence. A skeleton edition from the Chack-a-nunu Young boys was booked to get a Latin wedding. Nevertheless, the music group’s regular trumpeter was struggling to go to and telephoned Santiago to state he was sending an alternative. Santiago described what occurred on the night time from the gig: ‘Buck Clayton strolls in. Right now I’m stunned… (He) never really had rehearsed, talks about the music as he’s playing it, view reads it to excellence. And my thoughts that evening had been: if a man like Buck Clayton will come to try out with an unidentified kiddie music group… for 20 dollars on a Sunday night, I’ve surely got to escape the executing end of music. Because I understand I am no excellent instrumentalist, and the only path you are likely to make cash is you need to be a superstar performer/innovator, not really a sideman. If Buck can play this gig – I don’t desire to execute!’ Santiago kept in mind his uncle mentioning someone was offering a record shop. With money lent from his family members, he obtained the premises. Santiago went the shop, known as Casa Latina del Bronx, between 1951 and 1955 while their studies at university. At his dad’s insistence, he turned topics from music to business. Towards the finish of his program, the demolition of regional residential blocks triggered him to reduce virtually 1 / 2 of his trade. He offered the shop and took careers in various shops until 1 day an archive business friend informed him of a big vacant store on Potential customer Avenue and Westchester within the Bronx. The next day he place a deposit on the house and authorized a rent. He opened up the premises beneath the name of Casalegre Record Shop in November 1955, and went it until 1975. Santiago attained his goal to become ‘the most well-known, hippest, effective record shop within the Latin field’ inside the initial year utilizing the gimmick of offering a record apart free of charge (from a cut-price share he had obtained) with each disk purchased, and marketing this promotion seriously in an area movie-house and on the air. He also positioned advertisements in whatever Hispanic publication ‘popped-up’, including a tv guide that later on changed into the Latin music publication Muchándula, which its creator, Cuban Bernardo Hevia, still publishes in Puerto Rico within the 90s. Santiago’s following objective was to release a record organization, and in 1956 he proceeded to go into partnership using the clothes business owner, Ben Perlman, to co-found the Alegre Documenting Corp. Through the 1st four many years of the company, the label released 44 singles, including recordings by Vitín Avilés, Joe Cotto, Kako and Cuarteto Mayari. Continued advertising, by method of ‘freebie’ information and radio advertisements for Casalegre offering Alegre Records items, resulted in the achievement of the label. In past due 1959, a Casalegre store associate urged Santiago to go to the Tritons interpersonal golf club on Southern Boulevard within the Bronx to listen to Johnny Pacheco and his charanga (violins and flute group). ‘I don’t believe the music group experienced reached its 8th bar, once i decided I’m documenting this music group’, he later on stated. Suspecting that Pacheco will be a big strike, Santiago insisted that he indication a recording agreement, otherwise he’d not really record him. Pacheco yielded, and 1960’s Johnny Pacheco Y Su Charanga Vol. 1 – Alegre’s first record discharge – became the biggest-selling record up compared to that stage in the annals of Latin music. Several months following the smash strike achievement of Pacheco’s record, Santiago noticed Charlie Palmieri’s Charanga ‘La Duboney’ executing. ‘I believe Charlie continues to be registered and I talk with him. My parents and his parents understood one another before Charlie, Eddie (Palmieri) and I had been born. Charlie informs me he’s not really under agreement to anybody. I cannot believe the stupidity from the record sector. And lots of my achievement must be added to too little competition and foresight. If I’ve got Pacheco who marketed a 100, 000 albums in half a year, how come another record businesses don’t state: “hey, Charlie will be the #2 2 group, allow’s indication him up”. THEREFORE I end up getting the two best charangas’. Altogether, Santiago created 49 albums on Alegre between 1960 and 1966, including additional produces by Pacheco, the debut albums by Kako, Eddie Palmieri and Willie Rosario, recordings by Sabú Martínez, Charlie Palmieri, Dioris Valladares, Orlando Marín, César Concepción, Johnny Rodríguez (the old sibling of Tito Rodríguez), Mon Rivera (Santiago’s three trombone music group instrumentation on Que Gente Averigua offered new lease of life to Rivera’s profession), Tito Puente, Louie Ram memoryírez, Celio González as well as the famous 1st four Alegre All-Stars quantities. ‘The Alegre All-Stars was my baby’, stated Santiago in 1989, ‘I conceived it. I had formed it in my own mind 2 yrs before I place it into actions, because I had formed heard the Panart produces, the Cuban Jam Program ’s… the hippest Latin jazz thing I put ever heard in my own life. As well as the same influence those information acquired on me, I used to be informed afterwards the Alegre All-Stars acquired on other music artists… I chose why don’t I place all music group leaders together. Type a music group, and whatever seats are missing, obtain the best music artists in the rings that I’ve under agreement… I knew it had been going to become difficult for multiple reasons; one, Pacheco and Charlie currently had a notable difference unto their musical visions. Dioris was the ‘Ruler from the Merengue’. Kako was an introvert. How do you get this music group together. It had been solved in the Tritons on Wednesday nights… There is no music. It had been strictly improvised. There is no head. I used to be just like the supervisor… On the initial things on the Tritons I needed no musical insight, other than I will suggest a tune or two. They proved helpful it out among themselves. I noticed them every Wednesday and then had taken them in to the studio room and we’d an extremely easy time using the first recording, because although there is no music created, the guys have been playing these exact things going back six or eight Tuesdays.’ Recording cover developer, MC and previous Latin NY journal publisher, Izzy Sanabria, developed the thought of releasing The Alegre All-Stars Vol. 4 before Vol. 3. They promoted in newspapers the tapes to Vol. 3 had been lost. Santiago visited the dancehalls as well as the rings permitted him to avoid the proceedings, and following a fanfare and drum-roll, he’d announce: ‘“The Alegre All-Stars Vol. 3 is normally lost within the subway, please there’s a praise”… we surely got to the main point where we surely got to believe it ourselves. So when we released Vol. 3, the cover is the fact that description of shedding the tapes and we’re blaming Kako.’ In 1966, Santiago and Perlman marketed Alegre to Branston Music, Inc., that was the umbrella company that possessed Roulette and Tico Information. While remaining the dog owner and supervisor of Casalegre, Santiago worked well for Tico, creating Cuba Y Puerto Rico Boy… by Celia Cruz and Tito Puente (her 1st recording with the music group innovator), Celia’s Boy Con Guaguanco, among her biggest albums, plus they Contact Me La Lupe/A Mí Me Llaman La Lupe by La Lupe with Chico O’Farrill. Next, Santiago and Perlman co-founded Futura Information, which released an individual for Kako in addition to Willie Colón’s debut. In 1968, Santiago started a stint as personnel maker with Musicor Information, creating albums by Bobby Coveró (with Tito Puente), Kako (two albums – the very first with Camilo Azuquita, the next with Meñique), Orquesta Broadway, Tag Weinstein (the avant garde Cuban Origins), Willie Rosario, Dioris Valladares, Tito Rodríguez, La Playa Sextet (documented in Puerto Rico) and Tato Díaz. After his spell with Musicor, Santiago freelanced with different companies. He continuing the tradition from the Alegre All-Stars within the guise (for contractual factors) from the Salsa All-Stars, which he created for Salsa Information in 1968, and two albums with the Cesta All-Stars, which he co-produced for Joe Quijano’s Cesta Information. He also created albums by Orquesta Capri and Orquesta Tentación over the Salsa label. In 1970, Santiago started Mañana Information. Furthermore to making albums by Capri and Tentación for the label, he conceived and created the 1971 masterpiece Saxofobia Vol. 1 by Orlando Marín’s ‘La Saxofonica’. The record was the initial Latin record to be documented on 16 monitors. The music group ‘La Saxofonica’ presented a distinctive frontline of five saxophones (including Panamanian Mauricio Smith, who doubled on flute and organized two paths, and Mexican Dick ‘Taco’ Meza), with tempo section and voices. Louie Ram memoryírez had written half the preparations and made up one monitor. Charlie Palmieri and Paquito Pastor distributed the piano playing tasks. The recording was a musical achievement, but regrettably not really a industrial one. In 1975, Santiago co-founded Montuno Information with two additional partners, and created three albums for the business, like the debut produces by Yambú and Saoco (co-produced from the music group’s co-leaders, Henry Fiol and William Millán, and released on Mericana Information). In 1976, he published the liner records for the Alegre All-Stars compilation They Simply Don’t Makim Like Us ANY LONGER. The following 12 months he came back to Alegre, which by that stage was managed by Jerry Musucci’s Fania Information empire, to create Pa’ Bailar Na’ Ma’ by Dioris Valladares as well as the Alegre All-Stars 17th anniversary reunion Perdido (Vol. 5 or 6). The All-Stars also designated the function with an appearance at New York’s Madison Square Backyard. In 1978, Santiago became the Movie director of Special Tasks for Fania Information and was in charge of the reissue of traditional albums and/or immaculately chosen compilations with the irreverent and questionable Dominican singer, music group head and composer Frankie Dante and his Orquesta Flamboyán, Charlie Palmieri, Celia Cruz, Eddie Palmieri, Willie Colón and Héctor Lavoe, Willie Rosario, Mongo Santamaría, Tito Puente, Ismael Rivera and Rafael Cortijo, Sonora Ponceña, Orlando Marín, Típica 73 and Tommy Olivencia. Back again with Alegre in 1978, Santiago acted as advisor on Charlie Palmieri’s The Heavyweight and created the self-titled debut record with the youthful music group, Fuego ’77. In 1980, he ready a compilation for the Miami-based organization, Armada and Rodríguez (right now Armado and Fernández), entitled Al Santiago Presents THE VERY BEST Of Cuba, that was released on the Funny label. Through the 80s, the mainstream salsa market, which by the next fifty percent of the 10 years was mainly pumping out bland and uninspired salsa romántica item, criminally neglected to hire Santiago’s huge pool of abilities and encounter. In 1982, he created and hosted the best Music group Latino radio display. In 1984 and 1985, Santiago worked well like a music instructor for the brand new York City Table of Education. Even more radio work adopted in 1989 and 1990, when he was the disk jockey within the program Jazz Retrospect. By the end from the 10 years, the ever flexible Santiago went to graduate school to become psychologist.