Bachata Roja Legends featuring Puerto Plata

 

Following on the release, “Bachata Roja: Acoustic Bachata from the Cabaret Era,” iASO presents The Bachata Roja Legends Concert Series: a live showcase uniting revered figures from bachata’s storied past with young stars from the new generation.

In the early 1980s, Ramon Cordero, Ysidro Cabrera ‘El Chivo Sin Ley’ and Edilio Paredes collaborated to create a performance series called “Lunes de Amargue” (Amargue translates loosely as the bitter-sweet feeling of unrealized love). The series was so successful that copycat ‘Noches de amargue’ surfaced and bachata began to be referred to as “Musica de amargue”, a term still used today. The success of these shows helped bachata reach new more affluent audiences and was an important prelude bachata’s emergence internationally.  Chivo and Cordero’s vocal magnetism and dramatic stage presence joined with Edilio’s expressive virtuosity are irresistible. The historical collaboration is now reborn in the Bachata Roja Legends concert series.

Over 2008 and 2009 the Bachata Roja Legends headlined at a series of prominent US venues including Chicago Millennium Stage, The Baltimore Artscape Festival, The Queens Theatre, Harlem Stage, and The Santa Monica Pier.

The Legends used New York City as a hub for their US touring and in between concerts iASO organized a series of recording sessions at New York’s legendary Studio One East. The outcome is a collection of new songs by these extraordinary artists – delivered with a maturity of spirit and sonic quality never before afforded to their generation.  iASO will release the new Bachatata Roja Legends album in march 2010.

Line-up highlights include:

Edilio Paredes
Bio: http://www.iasorecords.com/index.cfm?subsecid=77
The requinto, or lead guitar, is the second voice of bachata, and the florid riffs of the virtuoso Edilio Paredes, who recorded with almost every major star of pre-electric bachata, pioneered the sound of bachata’s rise. Edilio’s performance always pushes the boundaries – his playing is deeply traditional yet brilliantly innovative. From a country where the guitar is ubiquitous and its masters idolized, Edilio is recognized as the most supreme of bachata’s classic period. The Bachata Roja compilation features Edilio’s lead guitar on Ramón Cordero’s “Amor del bueno”, and on tracks by Marino Perez, Blas Duran and Efrain Morel.


Ysidro Cabrera “El Chivo Sin Ley”
Bio: http://www.iasorecords.com/index.cfm?subsecid=164
Ysidro Ramon Cabrera, ‘El Chivo Sin Ley’ figures prominently as a bachatero whose enormous popularity and irresistible performance helped bachata break free of social stigma. El Chivo, Edilio Paredes and Augusto Santos have been musical collaborators since the early 1970s. In 1974 Chivo and Augusto achieved huge success with ‘El hijo sin padre’ – launching Chivo’s career as one of bachata’s most popular and prolific singer/songwriters.  Chivo earned his namesake with the 1977 hit “El Chivo Sin Ley” – recorded with Paredes.


Joan Soriano “El Duque”
Bio:  http://www.iasorecords.com/index.cfm?subsecid=171
Raised in a rural batey on the outskirts of Santo Domingo, Joan is from bachata’s heartland – where rural migrants from throughout the Dominican Republic and neighboring Haiti settled in the outlying districts of the Dominican Capital. Joan cut his chops in the 1980s and 1990s backing established singers like Bachata Roja’s Ramón Cordero and El Chivo Sin Ley, and modern bachata stars like Zacharias Ferrera and El Gringo de la Bachata. Joan has since launched a solo career as a captivating singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His arresting vocals and picked guitar straddle the divide of old and new, never leaving far behind bachata’s roots in the campos. Joan was featured in the bachata documentary “Santo Domingo Blues,” and his song “Ya encontré la mujer” was selected for World Music Network’s “Rough Guide to Bachata.” In early 2010, film director/producer Adam Taub is releasing a feature documentary on Soriano – titled “The Duke of Bachata.”