La Plaza; Notes From The Mambo Inn: The Story of Mario Bauza; 1309

The Plaza, show 1309, notes from the Mambo Inn, it's stereo, 29 minutes 17 seconds, WGBH TV Boston. Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on,

Mario is the first one to combine

The music of the blacks and the United States and African people and know each one equally as well. Machito and Graciela were the front power of the band, the front power. Machito's tanga when he sang, Machito's mambo in, which had no lyrics. But Machito was still in the front with Graciela, giving it the front power. But the real power was behind them, and that was Mario Bowser. What's up?

What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? What's up? We get all the ta-di-di-do-da, ta-di-da, ta-di-di-do-da, ta-di-di-do-da, ta-di-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do-di-do Right? It's simple, it's easy. Let's go from the top again, bass. Don't rush it. See?

Keeping that. That's the swing of the thing. One, two, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, They didn't want that name, they told me that, but we got to take that Afro stuff out, I said no. They said why? I said Afro-Cuban is the music that I represent, and I'm Afro-Cuban myself. My dependent, my descendant is from Africa, every black man come from Africa. So there's nothing to be ashamed about, all right? So either remain that way or I don't work here. You say, all right, have your way. Mary was born in Havana, Cuba.

And for an Afro-Cuban to make it at the top of any profession, he had to be not only disciplined but the best in his field. And the godparents gave him that discipline that was needed. And by the time he was 16, he was already a seasoned oboist and clarinetist and playing for the Havana Symphony. Once the Americans started buying businesses in Havana and other provinces of Cuba, they started replacing the Cuban bands with white American jazz bands. And he saw that most of the jobs in the hotels, and the academies in the white districts of Cuba were given to white or mulatto musicians. I used to play in Ferris Night Clubs.

Some people remember the Tropicana, the Bon Marchus, and so forth. And we used to play stock arrangements, not even our own arrangements, stock arrangements of American music. We were supposed to be the star band, and the Cuban musicians were relegated to second-class status. It's hard to say that that happened to me and I used to work in the band and I was the only black Musician They're playing in any of those swanky places in nightclub in Cuba and good day after I left They begin to integrate it the Tropicana Club is the one that began to integrate Musician I was there and they used to say where that black keep doing that with all these white musicians They used to say that like funny. I was a young kid. I was about 15 years old then I want you to see the picture of me, the old, lily-white orchestra, me, the little black thing there. And the band leader called me one day, he said, Mario, I got a hell of an idea for you. I said, what is this?

He said, have you ever seen that advertisement they got for Philip Murray? You ever see that kid, they say, Philip Murray, you see the uniform that he's using? I said, yeah, yeah, I've seen it. How you like to wear that? I said, no, I'm going to wear a tuxedo like you and a classic clothes just like you, everybody. I ain't going to use that Philip Murray stuff. I don't sell Philip Murray, I sell music. So you had to put up with all that kind of stuff. That's what Mario took out of Cuba. He said, I'm leaving. I'm leaving. And he had the best jobs. When Mario left, he had... like you were saying, in the national theater, he had shows in the morning. Then he had the casino. Then he had the cabaret. Well, in different places. He had jobs. But based on that, because they had to take him. But it wasn't spontaneous. In 1926, when he came here with Antonio Maria Romeo to make that recording for RCA, he discovered

Harlem. Harlem, he saw that the blacks were congregated, they had businesses, they had their own night life and there was no interference. And he liked that. And this always remained on his mind. So when he went back to Cuba, he started speaking about this with Machito, his childhood friend, and says, someday I'm going to go there to live. And the Paramount Theater, and the girl was doing a week engagement, Paul Whiteman, and they called him Paul Whiteman, the King of the Jazz. Never heard about that, but I walked into the theater. I was so impressed that I stayed there for four shows, I listened to this amazing orchestra, and they had a saxophone player there by the name Frankie Trombau.

I never heard nothing like that in my life, so I said, it's me, I've got to play saxophone. So I bought a saxophone and took a saxophone back to Cuba with me. And when I came back to America in 30 to leave, I was a saxophone player. And then, didn't stop right there, was a fellow singer very popular in Spain by name Antonio Machin. Both the vocalist were Don Aspiasso, the orchestra that came to America to introduce the Cuban music and the big band. So Machin had a quartet outside of Aspiasso band that he recorded for Victor too. So when Aspiaso Ben returned to Cuba, the trumpet player recorded with Machin, so Machin don't have no trumpet to record with him. So he said, what am I going to do now, I can't record with him, because the trumpet is the main thing, it's only one trumpet and two guitars and a vocalist. So I said to him, I said, well I think I can make that, so he said, you don't play trumpet.

I said, I don't play trumpet now, but if you buy me one, I'll play it. He said, you sure? I said, well you ain't got nothing to lose. Let's buy a cheap one. We went to the pawn shop, $15, and I start getting ambushes. I said, we got 15 days to record it. He said, don't worry about it, we're going to record it. And we did record it, 15 days. And after that, I didn't want to play saxophone. I give my saxophone player to a guy that came from Cuba and said, take him home, I don't want to play saxophone. I'm going to be a trumpet player. I'm Louis Armstrong racing. So I started copying all Louis Armstrong's solos and everything, and I went to Hague with my trumpets. And I got the first opportunity with a second-rate jazz orchestra they call it the Missourians in the famous Aboy Ballroom. I stayed with that band about three months or something like that,

and this chick whip was one of the biggest swing bands in the 30s. So he listened to me every night. So his trumpet player leaving to take a chair with Duke Ellington. So he told me if I wanted try out for the job. I try out for the job. So he said, you come to work tomorrow. So I said, I don't think I can, I ain't the man you're looking for. So he said, well, let me give it to you straight. I got what you need. And you have what I need. I said, what What you mean by that, I said, well music is international language. You don't speak English like I do, but I understand what you say. That's the same thing you do with my music.

I've got to teach you how to phrase my music. You read well, you've got a good intonation, good interpretation, but your phrasing, it gets too lacking at times. But at that time I'd been hanging around the Savoy, by that time they were playing up the Savoy, and Chick was up there. But Chick, he used to say, when I'd come in man, when I'd come in the Savoy, I'd come shoot that straight for standing in front of the bandstand, and I'd be up there, and Chick would see me with my horn and hear me play for Teddy, and he'd say, come on. And I'd go up on the stand and play, because I read well. So I played and then he let me play a couple of solos, but it was nice, it was nice. I never understood that, why, because we didn't want to chicken, he was such a big star, you know, I was scared to even speak to him. And then I met Mario.

And then Mario was playing with Cab Calloway. And so Mario ran into me, he said, I think I might have a job for you, with Cab Calloway. Now that is the dream of every black musician in New York, is to play with Cab Calloway, the best money. I think his payroll was more than Duke Ellington's, huh? So Mario said, I'll tell you what, we're playing at the Cotton Club now, it was a conspiracy. He said, I'm going to send you down there in my place.

You take the solos. And I got the job. I didn't ask how much I was making, I didn't ask enough, and I just went there, and that's That's when I joined Cab Calabas, and he brought me and the Cab Calabas. I'm so happy to have my son here with me tonight, the older he gets, the better he plays. Now, he will do his number one hit. Master! I don't know if you can hear me, but I can hear you.

I can hear you. I can hear you. I can hear you. I can hear you. I can hear you. I can hear you. When I left Cap Calloway Orchestra, I had a mind to organize a band for my brother-in-law, Machito. I brought with me a couple of his guys that used to write for Cap Calloway. So they told me if they didn't know nothing about this music, they said you don't have What about that music? I write that. All I want you to do is the orchestrate to get the sound of the big band, jazz bands. So Mario started to make arrangements, he started to go to the woodwork. Naturally, that was less money, because he played the saxophone there. And they would spend the night thinking about the ideas. And Mario was the one who always gave the ideas, I want this, I want that. Until the orchestra was formed, it debuted in a park plaza,

which was a dance hall right there in the 5th Avenue seat. that we've been rehearsing so long, let's play. So I said, well, we gon' play, nobody know about us. So there was a man here, they call him Happy Boys. So we got together with the Happy Boys, and the man in the ballroom gave us the ballroom, free. We work for the door, and we run that dance. And we took three dollars apiece for each musician. And the musician said, oh, what kind of money is this, man? I said, well, that's what it came in the box office. You want to play? But six months later, I was getting $180 for the night for my band. Six months later, I was getting $1,000 for the band. And then after that, Machito Band, Saturday night, we never got less than $1,500. That's the word.

When they really caught on is after tanga. See, they had been working, La Cunga Club in Midtown Manhattan, and most of its personnel were non-Latinos. I'm talking about a Jewish clientele Italian that people love Machito's Roombas because of its fiery nature. But once the Latin Jazz came into the picture and he started writing things that included jazz harmonies, that's when the music became more exciting and reached a broader public. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

We had one thing that was unique, rhythm, the rhythm section. You had to dance to that rhythm. If you didn't dance to that rhythm you were dead. So they had to be, had a good relationship. Now, if on top of that, you have this rich horn concept and rich harmonies, then you have two things that all the bands had at the time. The other bands were followers then. See, this was a new concept in terms of playing Cuban music

and incorporating as much richness as possible. Tanga was almost ritual when people danced to it. The tempo was incredible and everyone would be on the dance floor. I mean, they'd be screaming when he would start that number, they would scream and run the floor so they could dance and everybody wanted to dance in front of Machito which of course was a little difficult considering all the people on the dance floor and the Palladium had a large dance floor but that's what would happen when Danga went on the people just went for it. The steps just came because his music drove you to that you know you just your body did things that you didn't even up those steps. Those steps were rocking. Everything was rocking when you heard

that, you know. It was so steamy, you know, hot, hot, hot. And the good thing about all that was that the poor liked the rich, because the one who paid three pesos there came in, danced, drank what he could, but then came those people they would put those tables with bottles, and it was black and white. It was black, Chinese, Jewish, of all kinds, of all the nationalities that were here, they danced in the palerio. And that's how a lot of things happened in the dances.

We were kind of fanatized, so there was no radio or television promotion, nothing like now. So I got used to it, because I knew the orchestra was alive there, so I was like, hey, what's Machito's last record? So Machito started recording a lot, R.C. Abito, La Deca, it was the first one, Bernie, and so on. The band already was known in California because of the remotes that they would have from New York over WOR, one of these big stations that had a coast-to-coast hookup. La Conga Club used to promote La Conga and the Machito

Orchestra for 15 minutes, from midnight to 12, 15, sometimes even later, but whenever there was a spot open. So by the time that the band got out there, they were anticipating that with open arms. People from nearby states, from other cities in California, came like it was a pilgrimage to hear the Machito Orchestra. They wanted to hear the Machito and the Afro-Cubans. From there, they went to Japan. They were there for three months. It seems that the Afro-Cuban music or salsa or mambo, whatever you want to call it, the cha-cha-cha, had caught on and the people loved it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, Can we get one more?

Let's have one more. Once you get in something like music, it's hard to get out. It's no limit what you can do in music, it's no limit. So I want to leave something when I say goodbye to the soul, when they tell me, this is your Let's go home and eat something very good ahead. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. ? ? ? ? ? Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,

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