Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Video Of Live Performance By Wilfrido Vargas & His Band In Dominican TV

Here's Wilfrido Vargas' performance in the TV show De Extremo A Extremo, broadcast by Telemicro in the Dominican Republic on 1/28/13.

Monday, January 28, 2013

Juan Luis & Sus Mulatos

"La Ola":  This is a Merengue song made in the island of Puerto Rico in the Summer of 85.  The band was led by Bass player Juan Luis, hence the name "Juan Luis & Sus Mulatos".  The singer was Juanchy Vasquez, whose particular voice and singing style allowed him to have his own successful music project later on in NYC.

A very interesting feature in the making of this song is the fusion of Merengue and Plena.


Sunday, January 27, 2013

Ramón Orlando Valoy

Ramón Orlando Valoy is a merengue musician and son of Cuco Valoy.



Ramón Orlando (Valoy) was born in Manoguayabo, then part of Santo Domingo, D.N. (the capital city) and now part of Santo Domingo Province. He studied music at National Conservatory of Music in the Dominican Republic.

In the 1970s, after his father Cuco Valoy left the guitar duet Los Ahijados, he formed his first group, Los Virtuosos, with Cuco as the lead singer. Cuco kept the group together renamed as Cuco Valoy y Orquesta (Cuco Valoy and his Orchestra) in which he hired singers Peter Cruz and Henry Garcia. Ramón Orlando went on to form another group during that time. Years later, the Cuco Valoy group broke up and Ramon moved to Colombia to physically separate himself from the Dominican Republic due to his political differences with the Dominican president Joaquín Balaguer. Ramón Orlando then undertook a more ambitious musical project. He and then-famous merengue singers Peter Cruz and Henry Garcia formed La Orquesta Internacional (The International Orchestra), in which Ramón Orlando intended to be the composer and musical director, while Cruz and Garcia were intended to be the vocalists. However, of the first ten "single" songs to be recorded (and released individually), Ramón chose to sing four of them himself, which caused a split in the group. Peter Cruz and Henry Garcia then each formed a short-lived group. Upon the two vocalists' departure, Ramón Orlando quickly hired some vocalists with voices sounding similar to those of Cruz and Garcia in order to perform songs already gaining airplay.


Ramón Orlando is also the composer of the theme El Venao, which found a large audience in several Latin American countries including Colombia, Venezuela and Puerto Rico.
He was a nominee in the Latin Grammy Awards of 2005.

Source: Wikipedia

Premium Merengue, Courtesy Of La Gran Manzana

This is quite possibly one of the best-arranged Merengue songs made in NYC during the 80s decade..

La Gran Manzana was a local band which grew to become an international success.

A well-respected ensemble of musicians led by lead singer Victor Roque, Anthony Valdez (Bass), Jose Francisco Montero (Trombone), Marcos Burdier (Chorus/choreography) and many other talented guys, helped this band achieve its distinctive sound and look, which, by today's standards, continues to be unmatched in NYC.