Orquesta Akokán’s eponymous 2018 debut riffed on Cuba’s golden grooves from the 1940s and 1950s with fresh style and panache. In contrast, 2021’s 16 Rayos pushed the envelope of the classic mambo by coloring it with an edgy variety of rhythms and styles. These years were marked by widespread critical acclaim, intense world-wide touring, and a multitude of awards for Orquesta Akokán: Billboard Latin Music Award, Telemundo Latin American Music Award, Songlines Music Awards, and a GRAMMY nomination.

Caracoles, their third album, presents a glorious return to the iconic grooves of an era indelibly marked by Benny Moré, Perez Prado and Machito in New York bands and Cuba’s orquestas gigantes of the mid-twentieth century. Bringing together artists from New York and Cuba the group returns to Cuba to record at the renowned Abdala Producciones studios. This became a time to deepen and integrate the lessons learned in the previous two albums, the musicians playing together live in a room, carefully listening, interweaving their parts into a richly-textured whole, much like it might have happened in classic recordings from the 40s and 50s. The horns drive the tunes, making them irresistibly danceable, and foregrounding the emblematic sonic qualities that uniquely identify the mambo; yet as the musicians trade solos, they articulate an advanced bebop language, bringing to mind Charlie Parker —but in 2024 Havana. And despite the fact that the 10 original tunes of Caracoles may live sonically in the era of Benny Moré and Machito, nothing those fabulous maestros ever created sounds like these songs. Yes, it’s mambo, with its prototypical instrumentation and structures, but these songs belong one hundred percent to 2024.

And although Caracoles is of this moment, its raices stretch deep into the past. While some songs are everyday Cuban life story-telling, Ruiz, a tata —priest— informs his lyrics with a Palo Mayombe spirituality propelling the mambo back to its original meaning. Despite being popularized world-wide as a festive, light-spirited, danceable genre, mambo is not to be taken lightly in the Palo Mayombe religion. Mambo is both a song and a prayer, beseeching good spirits to guide one’s journey away from darkness. Two of the album’s songs —including the title tune— are in this Congo dialect, designed to be impenetrable by the uninitiated.

Thanks to its relentless and intricate rhythmic interplay and driving momentum, Caracoles is marked by its danceability — this is undoubtedly music that inspires the body to move. And true to the mambo’s true Congo origins, the tunes are designed to uplift the spirit, with lyricist Kiko Ruiz adding invocations to beings of good and light —including Benny Moré— who he is convinced guided the recording. Thus the profane and the prophetic are all interwoven throughout this album.

Caracoles’ fierce, effervescent grooves, Ruiz affirms, can “…vibrate your soul, which is precisely what the world needs right now”. The tunes offer an irresistible invitation to heed the title song’s invitation, “Cucha mambo que yo emboa montero…este mambo es pa’ ti.” Listen to this story, I bring it to you as a traveling song…This mambo is for you.”

About the musicians:
Jacob Plasse continues his extensive exploration of Latin music, faithful to a path that began in 2007 when he co-founded salsa brava band Los Hacheros.

Michael Eckroth, renowned as a renaissance musician, applies his profound knowledge of Cuban music and a longstanding history of collaborating with iconic greats from the Latin music and the jazz worlds, from Pedrito Martinez to John Scofield .

A light joyousness permeates the tunes’ radiant riffs, thanks to the spellbinding virtuosity of percussionists who revel in the same rhythmic fleetness of the Cuban maestros while adding their own stamp to the beats: Keisel Jimenez (Havana d’Primera, Arturo O’Farrill) and the young phenoms Roberto “Tato” Vizcaino (who has collaborated with esteemed musicians, including Roberto Vizcaíno, Gabriel Hernández, Chucho Valdés) and Yuya Rodriguez (daughter of renowned musician and percussionist Octavio Rodriguez Rivera, and winner of Cuba’s Fiesta del Tambor in 2019).

Grounding the percussionists is the formidable bass of Gaston Joya, who was awarded the Order for Cuba’s National Culture in 2017 and who can be heard on virtually all the most highly acclaimed Cuban jazz records of the last two decades.

And the fierce, dynamic horns (nine total!) are led by alto saxophone player Cesar Lopez, former member of Irakere, Cuba’s greatest jazz band; tenor saxes Emir Santa Cruz Hernández and Jose Luis “Chewy” Hernández; baritone saxophonist Evaristo Denis; trumpeters Harold Madrigal Frías, Reinaldo “Molote” Melián, Orlando “Bocasa” Peña; trombonists Heikel Fabian and Yoandy Argudin.

For the first time in their recordings, Orquesta Akokán spotlights the layered luminosity of vibrant female coros, care of Lisset Caro Farquenson, Diana C. Caro Farquenson, Gina D’Soto and Natalia Pérez. Additionally, the smoky, potent alto of Carolina Oliveros (from alt-Latin tropical futurism band Combo Chimbita) graces “Cha-Cha-cha pa’ ca”.

Last but certainly not least, the sonic quality of Caracoles was carefully ensured by Cuban engineer Jorge “Beny” Benitez, who apprenticed under Benny Moré’s engineer and has recorded a veritable who’s who of Cuban performers.