"Bamboleo" has been added to your list of bookmarked artists
close
Bamboleo
Biography
Like sweet rum and smooth cigars, Bamboleo is another one of those fine Cuban exports that, once you get a taste of it, one sampling just won't be enough. The 14-member timba group is one hot number, from its music and choreography to its well-dressed singers and musicians. Lazaro Valdes leads the band, and he also plays the piano, arranges, composes, and writes songs. A Havana native, he was enrolled in the Alejandro Garcia Caturla Academy during the 1970s. He established Bamboleo after spending time performing with such artists as Pachito Alonso, Bobby Carcasses, and Hector Tellez. He culled musicians from the cream of the crop, incorporating into his new troupe many who had trained at Havana's National School of the Arts. He added some spark with vocalist Haila Mompie, who in turn recruited vocalist Vannia Borges. Another Havana native, Borges became a music student when she was five years old, and first sang professionally with an all-woman outfit known as D'capo in the early '90s. Four years later, she moved on to Pachito Alonso y su Kini Kini, leaving in 1997 to add her talents to Bamboleo. Guantanamo native Yordamis Megret came to the group in 1998, a year after Mompie left.
report abuse