Song Of The Day 4/5/2016: José Fajardo – “Vamonos P'al Uno”
José Fajardo was a flutist, and charanga flutists like him and those in the Cuban ensemble Orquesta Aragon were most responsible for giving their instrument any measure of cool it might have had in contemporary idioms. (Sit down Ian Anderson. You're a likable dude, but sit down.) The flute was one of the distinctive features of charanga, along with the unison vocals, tympani and miniature violin combos. That last feature is what sucked me into Fajardo's “Vamonos P'al Uno”: The string arrangement is magnificent. Flute improvisations over such bubbling violin beds are a hallmark of charanga, particularly ones from wooden 5-key flutes, closer to piccolos in the Anglo-Saxon experience. After Fajardo split Cuba for Miami after the revolution, the charanga went through a revival period, probably as a side effect of the cha-cha madness that overtook the cast of Mad Men in the '60s.