 |
Gladys 'Bobi' Céspedes is no newcomer to music, even though her solo debut. Rezos, has only just been issued. But it's the culmination of many years work as a singer, songwriter, and performer. She's been part of Planet Drum (or Bembé Orishas, as it's now known) with Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead, and for a number of years has helped front Conjunto Céspedes with her brother Luis. Finally, though, she's stepped out on her own.
"Well, why not?" she laughs. "It's now that the opportunity's presented itself. I had lots of material available. I was approached by a very great producer, Greg Landau. Both [record label] Six Degrees and Greg fell in love with my ideas, back when they were just ideas. Everything clicked, and that's all it takes, the right people to be in love with the right idea at the right time. I wanted to try an album. This was the moment, and I jumped on it."
Asked to describe what she does, Céspedes just says, "It's my music! I am a sonera, and I'm a very innovative sonera. I believe this has a little bit of son all over the place, with a funk feel to it. I think that Greg Landau called it funkloric music. So I guess that was his writer's license to explain the feel produced by the mix of funk and Cuba. The "loric" part, I suppose, is speaking about the Cuban rhythmic lore. It's really ocha music, ocha rhythms, ocha instruments - everything we're doing is orisha oriented.
Being a priestess in my folklore or religion doesn't just mean being a religious person, it means being a folklorist. It means knowing and doing everything, it means living it. Everything I do has to do with the legacy my people left me. It's all about ocha, the black people in general. It's a mix of African and Spanish rhythm. So then you can talk about what type of Spanish rhythm came to Cuba, and it takes you back to the Moors. It's been mixed so many times that what I'm trying to do now is just keeping up with the times." Listening to the music, she's done more than simply keep up; she's forged a thoroughly individual path, balancing all the elements to perfection, looking to the future while still respecting the tradition that's nurtured her.
"Folklore has to fit the situation," she explains "There's growth we have to undergo, in order to fit our culture. It's a very delicate process that we undergo, trying to mix what's going on today with what went on yesterday without saying I know better than my ancestors. I'm trying to be very careful about that."
She has some top-notch help beside her. In addition to Landau, who's been in the control booth for Susana Baca and Patato, among many others, fellow Bembé Orisha member Nengue Hernandez plays a whole battery of percussion instruments, while Oakland hip-hoppers One Drop Scott and Rahsaan Fredericks bring on their funk with the drum programming and bass skills. The real catch, though, is Oriente Lopéz, a pianist and flutist who's one of Cuba's most respected arrangers, with a C.V. that includes everyone from Silvio Rodriguez to Paul Simon.
The deep grounding of the record is evident on tracks like "Ogun," a Yoruba invocation to the deity Ogun that works around call-and-response vocals accompanied by traditional Afro-Cuban drums. And on "Obatala," a song dedicated to Céspedes' own orisha, the African rhythms remain strong under some jazzy piano and funky guitar work. It's a praise song, but not in the typical African tradition, she explains, because "I believe that all the rules of Yoruba tradition can't be applied to a straight Cuban experience, given the changes that have gone on across the water. In Cuba sometimes a song is praise, sometimes it's praise and a prayer as well. All of the songs here are considered praise prayers to orisha."
"Awoyo" brings in traditional rhythms on timbales and congas, then seamlessly melds them with a modern dance groove that fits into the percussion ensemble. It's just another way she brings all the threads of her personality together, and lets them mix merrily on the dance floor. Certainly one of the most interesting tracks is "California," a paean to her adopted home (Céspedes lives in the San Francisco Bay area). Again, the call and response vocals underpin everything, then out of left field sitar and tablas appear. Remarkably, it works.
"Why make such a big deal of California? It was here that the strength of my music grew, where I became more solid. People accepted my music here. My mother loved it here when she came. She did nothing but sing and compose songs. It's been a fruitful place for me to work, the best besides Cuba. I've been a lot of places in the world, and I always come back here, and I'm blessed to live in a very nice area of California. And this song began with the chorus "What a good time you have in California." My mother came up with that. When she was here she was so well received, the matriarch, and she got a lot of attention, and she was pleased. She was a composer and singer, and sang in a duo with her brother. Unfortunately, because of the politics, she never got official recognition. So coming here and getting the recognition became a very big thing for her. To some people it might sound silly, but it's what I was feeling at the time, it's important for me to keep her alive."
Céspedes has been settled on the West Coast for a long time now, far longer than she ever lived in Cuba, in fact. She came to the U.S. in 1959, drawn by "the same thing that brings most immigrants - the hope for a better life, more opportunity, more ability to make money. I was 13 when I came. I went directly to New York City, and lived there for 10 years, then came to the Bay Area, and I love it. It's a good place for creating, very conducive for artists doing their thing. I'm happy here."
In 1967 she became a Yoruba-Lucumi priestess, a position of responsibility that she takes very seriously. And there are many of her countrymen around her in San Francisco. Tradition is her stock-in-trade, if you will. Even when she's expanding and renewing it, she's well aware of it. It's her life in more ways than one, since she's not only a singer, but also an academic: "I lecture at universities on the folklore of Cuba. I do workshops, and I finish them with performances, sometimes just by the performers, sometimes by the students as well. I talk on different subjects, like the role of medicine in our tradition, the role of women, and on and on and on."
But music is her main love and focus. In the 1980s Bobi, her brother Luis, and her nephew Guillermo formed Conjunto Céspedes, combining traditional poetry and Cuban music with modern horn arrangements. They released Una Sola Casa (One House) on the now-defunct Xenophile label, an energetic mix of sones, jazz-descarga, danson-mambo, guaguanco and more that was decidedly ahead of the Cuban boom curve.
Bobi is now more than ready to have her own band, letting everyone hear her own music. Céspedes juggles a lot of things - her teaching, singing with others - but "my music is first. Everything falls behind that. I don't have any little kids, and everyone knows that what I do is sing, perform and write. Nothing can get in the way of that - everything else is on the periphery. I'm hoping to do another album. I have a three album contract, and I think I'll be getting into the new one soon, once this is out. I'm not saying what it'll be like, though."
One thing that won't scare her is putting her own name and her own music out there. It's a very personal statement, and she's ready to take it. "I've had the responsibility on my shoulders for years, even when it hasn't appeared like it. I've had other help, which I still have - a musical director onstage, for example. It's very important that I mention the fact that I got good at it because I've done it for so many years. So I'm not afraid or apprehensive, because it's nothing new. It's just a matter of getting the credit for it.
 |
Bobi Cespedes and her band have open availability for 2014-2015.
Bobi Cespedes has open touring availability. She is based in Oakland CA.
Herschel Freeman Agency, Inc. has established a reputation for finding innovative, traditional musicians from throughout North America and around the world.
Our roster encompasses established and emerging artists from India, Ireland, Hawaii, Guinea, France, Cuba, Italy, Scotland, Japan, Germany, Sweden and England, and an array of musicians from Canada and the United States.
