Manteca
Dizzy Gillespie and His Orchestra · 1947 · released as a single · written by Dizzy Gillespie, Chano Pozo & Gil Fuller
A bebop trumpeter and a Cuban conga player write a tune together, and Afro-Cuban jazz is born.
- Latin jazz
- congas
- trumpet
- clave
Why it matters
In 1947 jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie added Cuban percussionist Chano Pozo to his big band. Together with arranger Gil Fuller they wrote Manteca: Pozo came up with the introduction and the interlocking riffs, and Gillespie wrote the bridge. They recorded it for RCA Victor in December 1947.
It was the first tune built on the clave to become a jazz standard, and it's one of the founding records of Afro-Cuban jazz. Salsa's big-band side, its horns and its jazz solos, owes a lot to it.
Pozo was killed in December 1948, a year after the recording.
What to listen for
- Chano Pozo's congas and chants: a Cuban drummer at the heart of a jazz big band, which nobody had heard before.
- The introduction and the layered riffs of the main theme (guajeos) are Pozo's: short patterns stacked on top of each other, the same idea a salsa horn section uses in its mambo section today.
- In the middle, the bridge swings like straight jazz and Gillespie's trumpet takes over. Then the Cuban groove comes back. Hearing the feel change and change back is the whole point of the tune.