Chucho Valdés Royal Quartet

A month away from his 83rd birthday, Chucho Valdés—one of the most important Cuban musicians of all time, an emissary who broke geopolitical borders by making irrepressible music—debuted a new band. His Royal Quartet was a trans-generational supergroup of Cuban talent, stretching from his own octogenarian status to that of Roberto Jr. Vizcaino, a Havana-born percussionist who had yet to turn 30. There was also Horacio “El Negro” Hernández, the legendary Cuban drummer, and athletic bassist José Armando Gola. The Royal Quartet’s debut, Cuba and Beyond, was a wide-ranging delight, from the constantly percolating tangle of “Tatomania” to the slow-motion sophistication of “Habanera Partida,” where the band rumbled restlessly beneath Valdés’ ever-patient lyricism. They even took Mozart for a wild ride on—what else?—“Mozart a La Cubana.”

Valdés began to emerge as a major figure in international jazz in the late ‘70s, when his groundbreaking Afro-Cuban institution, Irakere, began to grapple with his defining mission: “Bringing together jazz and the ancestral forms in a coherent fashion, and with quality,” as he once put it. The band signed a deal with Columbia and debuted stateside at Carnegie Hall in June 1978, upstaging the likes of Bill Evans and Mary Lou Williams. The son of Cuban piano giant Bebo Valdés, the pianist at the group’s fore went on to form other bands, enjoy a strong solo career, and run Irakere as a generational clearinghouse for Cuban talent. A link between nations divided by politics, Valdés’ spirited music has long transcended such controversy, just as the Royal Quartet does now.