Paquito d'Rivera

b. 4 June 1948, Havana, Cuba. Known for a silky-smooth tone and evocative phrasing in the manner of Dexter Gordon, Paquito D’Rivera is one of the great jazz saxophonists of his era and is also a highly proficient clarinettist. After training in the Havana Conservatory and participating in Cuba’s unique avant garde jazz renaissance in the 70s, D’Rivera migrated to New York, USA to shine in the centre of the jazz world. The son of a Cuban tenor saxophonist who once played with Benny Goodman, D’Rivera made his professional debut on soprano when he was only six years old. At 12, he entered the same music conservatory as his future collaborator and bandmate, pianist Chucho Valdés. The two men formed Orquestra De Música Moderna in 1965. By 1970, as a result of a successful showing at the Warsaw Jazz Festival, D’Rivera, Valdés and several of the younger members of the Orchestra decide to form Irakere, one of the most influential groups in Cuban music history. Irakere’s radical exploration of the electric possibilities raised by jazz fusion groups such as Weather Report and the Mahavishnu Orchestra led to a record contract with Columbia Records in 1979. In 1981, during a tour of Spain, D’Rivera defected to the USA. He was eagerly accepted into the New York jazz scene, and started a group called the Havana/New York Ensemble, which produced stars such as percussionist Daniel Ponce, pianists Hilton Ruiz, Michel Camilo and Danilo Pérez, and trumpeter Claudio Roditi. During the 80s D’Rivera also collaborated with Cuban expatriates Israel ‘Cachao’ López, the legendary bass player often credited with inventing the mambo, and Mario Bauza, the legendary orchestra leader who infused the basic jazz vocabulary with Cuban ideas while working as musical director for Dizzy Gillespie’s band in the 40s. In 1988, D’Rivera became a founding member and featured soloist with Gillespie’s United Nations Orchestra (he took over the leadership following the trumpeter’s death in 1993). In 1991, D’Rivera, Gillespie and Gato Barbieri were honoured with Grammy Lifetime Achievement awards for their contribution to Latin Music. During the 90s, D’Rivera worked with Chucho’s father Bebo Valdés, McCoy Tyner, Tito Puente, Astor Piazzolla, and Jerry González, among others. In addition to touring with his various ensembles, which include the chamber music group Triangulo, the Paquito D’Rivera Big Band, and the Paquito D’Rivera Quintet, he made several recordings with his own Caribbean Jazz Project. In 1996, he released the Grammy Award-winning Portraits Of Cuba, a stunning collection of Cuban classics recorded with a formidable big band conducted by the premier Latin jazz arranger Carlos Franzeti. D’Rivera’s work as a classical composer came to prominence during the same decade, and he regularly performs his own compositions with symphony orchestras.