Paquito D'Rivera: "Che hated gays, blacks and artists"

The Cuban musician and clarinetist Paquito D'Rivera (Havana, 1948) is an undisputed figure on the international scene, especially in the jazz field.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
17 November 2022 Thursday 23:51
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Paquito D'Rivera: "Che hated gays, blacks and artists"

The Cuban musician and clarinetist Paquito D'Rivera (Havana, 1948) is an undisputed figure on the international scene, especially in the jazz field. Prompt and very broad with stylistic perspectives, in his extensive artistic biography, his relationship with the Cuban pianist Chucho Valdés stands out, with whom he met for the first time in 1962.

Later they would collaborate again very fruitfully in the Irakere group, and in 1980 D'Rivera left Cuba due to disagreements with the regime. This 2022 they have met again and from this came the album I missed you too and a tour of Latin America, the United States and Europe (this past summer they did it at the Porta Ferrada Festival).

And today there will be an opportunity to see them perform again specifically at the Barcelona Jazz Festival (Palau de la Música, 8:30 p.m.), in sextet format. An evening that will also serve for D'Rivera to receive the festival's Medal of Honor. La Vanguardia subscribers have a 15% discount on the price of tickets, as long as they buy them at Entradas de Vanguardia.

He spoke with La Vanguardia a few days before going to Las Vegas, where yesterday, Wednesday, he was recognized for his artistic career within the framework of the Latin Grammys that will be awarded tonight local time (early Friday morning in Spain).

What do you feel when they give you an award of these characteristics? the weight of the passage of time?

You always have to be grateful when one, several or many people have dedicated their time to recognize my work. Although the truth is that I have never worked for the awards; For me the prize is having met so many interesting people throughout all these years. The prize is my father for having given me this marvelous career as being a musician.

Do you hope to return to play in your native Cuba one day?

I don't stop thinking that every day, but if the people and governments of the world continue to support the crap of that system, well, that will never happen. And I will not return while that president is in power, and while they blame everything on the blockade and the embargo instead of what they are and do. In short, the absolute failure of his system for more than a century of socialism. Because socialism is like an ATM that is broken, and despite that, a line of assholes forms and, even if they see that it doesn't work, they keep going.

Well, you met one of the icons of Castroism, Che Guevara, right?

Yes Yes. I don't know if he went to the house of a girlfriend he had. I was 15 or 16 years old and I wanted to meet that asshole, like everyone else at that time, and I remember that at one point he asked me what I did and I told him "I'm a musician, Commander", and he replied, "No, no; I ask you what do you work for". He always hated gays, blacks and artists. He wrote very derogatory phrases about blacks, don't forget, and he also wrote that phrase that said that "writers carry original sin." That is to say, that the original sin for him was thinking and speaking. And musically speaking, it seems that he had a triangular ear, it wasn't even square.

And now you have returned to play with Chucho Valdés after many years.

We have officially returned to play after 42 years. I arrived in Spain on May 5, 1980 and I have not returned to Cuba. And now we decided to do this reunion, we've made an album and we haven't stopped touring in just one year. And now at the Palau de la Música, which is one of my favorite places.

Without forgetting that the next day, this Saturday, they pay homage to him at the Liceu Conservatory.

The thing about the Conservatori is because I recorded with a wonderful group called The Barcelona Clarinet Players. And we will present the album entitled Fantasías barcelónicas, which is a piece that was commissioned from me.

Will they play tomorrow the same thing that could be heard in summer, at the Sant Feliu de Guíxols festival for example?

In improvised music like jazz you never know what's going to happen. It may be the same repertoire but not the same solos or the same improvisations. Jazz is a random thing.

Will they interpret something from the Irakere era?

Yes, the Adagio, which is the second movement of Mozart's concerto for clarinet and orchestra that was very successful in those days of Irakere. And we will also play the first piece that Chucho and I recorded when I was 14 years old and which is called Mambo influenced. It appeared on the album Jesús Valdés y la combo de él.

Looking back, how do you remember your reunion with Bebo Valdés, Chucho's father?

In 1981 yp was touring with Dizzy Gillespie in Europe. When we arrived in Sweden, Dizzy told me that he wanted to see Bebo Valdés -I didn't know I knew him-. I've known Bebo Valdés since I was a child, he was a friend of my father and my family in New York, and I took him to a very nice restaurant where baby played. And there I thought that one day I would produce a record for him, which I was able to do in 1995 with the title of Bebo rides again, a very nice record.

When you look back, do you feel nostalgic or melancholy compared to the present?

I am delighted with the present, but it always has blemishes. And yes, I am melancholy and very sad with the destruction they have done to our country.

After the concert with Chucho, how will your collaboration with him continue?

I have my own group and he has his own project that is very beautiful and is called La Creación. We will do a combination of both. Surely sometime the phone will ring for us to do something together. And besides, I work a lot with symphony orchestras, big bands and other things. Look, I'm a Gemini and I get bored doing the same thing all the time. Now I have just premiered a very important symphonic work with Yo-Yo Ma entitled The journey which is a concerto for cello, clarinet and orchestra.

What do you consider yourself?

A musician to dry. I have a purely classical background and since I was a child my father was very Ellingtonian, who said that there are only two types of music, the good one and that other thing. And I've always distanced myself from that other thing, and that's why I like Duke Ellington and Coltrane as much as Tito Puente or Stravinsky, who is one of my favorite composers. And I like both listening to Manuel de Falla and Chick Corea.

Is it what you listen to when you are at home?

In general I listen to a lot of classical, symphonic, some jazz and some Brazilian, and a lot of boleros. Ravel, Stravisnky...