By Deardra Shuler
Latin Salsa icon, Willie Colon, is well known throughout the
world.
A renowned singer, composer,
humanitarian, political activist, trombonist and liaison for the Latin American
community to the Mayor’s Office, Willie will be appearing at Lehman Center for
the Performing Arts in the Bronx on Saturday, June 8
th at 8:00 p.m.
The concert is being produced by
Lehman Center
and Jose Raposo as part of the 2013 Blue Note Jazz Festival and the theme of
the show will be in dedication to the Nuyorican community, a term referring to
the Puerto Rican Diaspora located in
New
York State
and City.
Born in the Bronx, Willie
Colon has been playing music since age 14.
“I’ve been making music since a kid.
I grew up in the South Bronx on 139th Street. I listened to all the musicians on the
streets. My grandmother bought me a
trumpet when I was 11 years old and I learned to play it, eventually switching
to the trombone. This is why I want to
dedicate my concert at Lehman to a Nuyorican theme. There have been Puerto Ricans in NY since the
1900s. The migration started right after
the Jones Act when the US
made Puerto Rico US
territory. There was a mass migration in
the early 1900s, when my family came over. Once the Nuyoricans came to America they also faced the Jim
Crow era along with the Blacks. In fact,
many of us learned to speak English from our Black brothers. There is a link between the Latinos and our
African American brothers. Much of our
music is from Africa. Bomba is African, and Meringue is
African. As a matter of fact, back in
the 1960s, about 50% of the crowd listening to our music was African
American. We were playing boogaloo in
English and a lot of instrumental stuff back then,” said Colon.
Willie Colon has recorded over 40 albums and sold 30 million
records worldwide. He has been nominated
for 11 Grammys and received a Lifetime Achievement Latin Grammy Award. An accomplished artist, he has worked with
the best, folks likes Ruben Blades, David Bryne, Hector LaVoe and Celia Cruz, and
even appeared with the Fania All-Stars.
In 2010, he produced “Estar lejos,” a duet recording with Colombian
musical star Fonseca. “Fonseca is kind
of a balladeer. He sent me an email
asking me to listen to the song that eventually became Estar lejos. I did an arrangement and sent it back to him.
It was then he asked that we record the song together. Fonseca came to NY and brought some folks who
used these little cameras which we used to record in the studio and then in the
streets. The video came out
excellent. Before we knew it, the song
took off and was nominated for a Grammy.
I never expected it to turn out so well. Currently, I have a few projects in mind. I would really like to put together a group
of guys with a sketch and just play. As
soon as the opportunity presents itself, that is what I plan to do,” remarked
the trombonist.
Mr. Colon has served as a member of several boards of
directors. He chaired the Association of Hispanic Arts. He was on the board of
the United Nations Immigrant Foundation.
He was the first minority to serve on the ASCAP National Board of
Trustees. In 1991, Willie was awarded Yale University's
CHUBB Fellowship. He was a
spokesperson for CARE and he campaigned to end U.S.
military occupation and the practice of bombing the Island
of Vieques in Puerto
Rico, which earned him the EPA’s Environmental Quality Award. “I have been involved in a few political
interests. I was involved in the
elections in Venezuela
trying to help the opposition candidate against the socialist
dictatorship. I produced a theme song
for the campaign of Henrique Capriles Radonski and sent it to him. It was just a campaign jiggle but it became a
big hit. It went to countries like Puerto
Rico and Columbia,
places that had nothing to do with the campaign. It went viral and got millions of hits. It’s kind of cool to see stuff like that
happen. I plan to play the song during my
Lehman concert,” remarked Colon.
“I also directed my attention toward a
resolution concerning immigration. As
you know, immigration is an important issue affecting the Latin American
Community right now. In Latin America, there is huge debt and mismanagement caused
via governmental leaders. I personally
believe it’s the result of presidents and Dictators spending and borrowing
monies for their own resources which has put their various countries in debt. Quincy
Jones, Bono and me, brought a petition to Pope John Paul asking him to sign on
to help forgive Third World debt for all the
Latin American countries in debt to the World Bank. The Pope did sign and we
took the petition at that time to President Clinton. I was also involved with Care. I went up into the Andes and helped the indigenous people there make micro-banks, explaining how the people could pool
their monies together to buy livestock and help construct water tanks, etc.”
said Colon of
his political and humanitarian efforts.
Colon
is proud of his Latin roots and hopes to participate in the Puerto Rican Day
Parade which occurs the day after his June 8th concert. He is most proud of his Latin folkloric albums because it was the music his
grandmother loved. He hopes to play some
of his most heart rendering music at Lehman and looks forward to greeting his fans
and Latin music enthusiast on Saturday, June 8th.
Interested parties can buy tickets to the Willie Colon
concert by calling the
Lehman
Center box office at
718-960-8833 or on line www.lehmancenter.org.
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