Juan Carlos Pinol

Since I was a child I have been like a sponge; I try to absorb in a self-taught way what interests me about music and I have never let myself be carried away by fashions or commercial currents. I feel disproportionate respect and passion for our rhythms and cultural traditions, although I have not rejected foreign influences such as jazz or Brazilian music that, from my conceptual and rhythmic point of view, are twinned with ours as "matches from the same box ”. Of the many variants of jazz I prefer the cool and the bebop; from Brazil with bossa nova and samba.

Thus I was guiding my learning between the filin and the popular Cuban rhythms, nourishing myself with the poetry and music of those old bohemian troubadours that I saw in yellowish photos with their hats and smoking cigars, of which I am an eternal debtor. But the rumba always caught my attention in a special way, unconsciously one could say, because it was in my blood and I didn't know it.

At home, when we watched TV, I would stop what I was doing to watch Celeste Mendoza, Mercedita Valdés or Los Papines and I remember my mother saying: “But who will this boy be? he left”. The old man, meanwhile, laughed. I would take his shoe shine box and start playing. Rather, to make noise. When I started with the tumbadoras, I sought out various percussionists to learn the technique, the sound and the rhythms. I had several teachers and I thank all of them, but especially one: Angelito El Chivo, a famous and famous rumbero, a character full of anecdotes and incredible experiences; His classes were fun, with a total knowledge of the rumba and the secrets of Abakuá guitar playing. I told him to show me that and he always told me the same thing: “After you 'swear', we'll talk!”. He taught me the rudiments of the rumba, to sing playing the base, the keys and the fifth. I owe him a lot.

I had the great fortune to learn and share on several occasions with rumba dancers of the stature of El Goyo, José del Pilar and Chapotín. It was a blessing to drink directly from that source of knowledge and, furthermore, to know in good faith their codes of life and respect in endless rumbles that I will always carry in my memory. My style of singing, or "saying", which is actually what I do, is a mixture of knowledge experienced in peñas, rumbas and in all the places where I could sneak in, sometimes going unnoticed and later studying at home everything that I saw and listened. That's why there are people who have known me for many years who now see me sing and say: “Asere… and where did you come from?”.

Singing is what I like the most, feeling how the echo of my voice bounces off the walls, the brotherhood with the musicians on stage, releasing my songs, expressing my particular way of seeing things or singing a bolero by our great composers my “rumbeao” style, crying over it, feeling the emotion it produces in me and in the audience. Sometimes I connect so much that at that moment it is as if it is not me, it is as if some entity takes over my being. So I let it flow like fresh water, enjoying that magical energy that leads me down surprising paths.

My format “Lo de Piñol” is minimalist: guitar, bass, minor percussion and voice. I prefer it acoustic, looking for that intimate concept that we inherited from our elders and that, unfortunately, has been lost. I mix it with the contemporary of my melodies, harmonies and a poetic text in which I try to honestly and openly reflect the reality in which we live. My trova is “blue” (sad), contained, it shoots out of my heart, which has no other purpose than to express what I feel and have had stuck in my chest all my life. I call myself an artist underground, not only for being on the margin (by my own choice, beyond what is established) from the media and the "official jam" of the "artistic representation companies" and being totally self-taught, but because the music that I defend comes from the most deep, marginal and genuine part of our culture. As I say in one of my topics Musician, poet and madman: "I don't want to be part, asere, of that manipulation that cools your heart, ceasing to be who you are."

But going back to the rumba and the filin, in my opinion both have a great connection with each other, as the latter was developed precisely in the Callejón de Hamel, located in the Havana neighborhood of Cayo Hueso, cradle of excellent rumberos, bataleros and comparsa players. , bearers of the most autochthonous Afro-Cuban tradition. The great troubadours César Portillo de la Luz, José Antonio Méndez, Ñico Rojas and Angelito Díaz, among others, undoubtedly drank from that rich source, who were influenced, in turn, by the magic of a jazz that turned the bolero upside down. , thus creating a free, unique and wonderful side within that genre. To say filin and rumba is to say Cubanness, and for me it is an enormous pride to be heir to those values that I defend tooth and nail.