Luciano Pozo González is a famous name in Cuban musical history. Known as "Chano Pozo" (1915-1948), he entered the fascinating jazz world with his tumbadora, thus initiating a true revolution with deep Afro-Cuban roots mainly in bop, later on called cubop. He is undoubtedly one of the most important and significant legends in Cuban music at all times.
An intuitive musician and innovative creator in the performance of our African-origin drums, songs and dances, Chano "as everybody called him" was perhaps never aware of his own genius nor that his work, born of a natural and spontaneous talent, would change and have a great impact on the career of the main conductors of American bands in the 40´s, especially of trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie, who since that moment loved beyond any limit the rhythms of lustful fires bursting from the tumbadora frantically played by Chano.
Nobody knows for sure how the musical personality of Chano Pozo was created. Maybe the terrible abakuá íre
mes, founding spirits of the earth and the voluptuous yorubas deities invoked in the courtyards of Havana slums, had something to do with it. Undoubtedly, Africa lived in Chano Pozo´s heart in a pure ecumenical sense "nobody ignored that Chano Pozo was a respectable member of the abakuá cult and that he fervently worshipped Changó and Yemayá", also acquainted with the secrets of supernatural powers "present" in the so-called "Regla Conga".
The truth is that one day Chano Pozo arrived at the legendary Cuban RHC "Cadena Azul" broadcasting station as a cigarette-pack delivery boy. However, he felt bewitched by the live music regularly broadcast in programs and rehearsals. His blood boiled in his veins and he felt the need of playing any tumbadora he could find. And he did it in a so marvelous way that he was soon considered as part of the musical team of the broadcasting station.
Later on Chano Pozo organized his own musical group, "Conjunto Azul", and made some recordings. Then he joined as a tumbadora player the famous "Congo Pantera" show of Cabaret Tropicana. These were times of successful creation when themes like BLEN BLEB BLEN, PIN PON PAN and NAGUE, just to mention a few, crowned him with a permanent halo of popularity.
As it often happens with the most legitimate popular geniuses, the figure of Chano Pozo gets mixed with his private life even misleading his closest friends. Born in a popular Havana slum called "El África", located in Oquendo and Zanja streets, at a very early age Chano got in touch with violent, mean and rude people from the underworld. Wearing canvas shoes and with aggressive manners, Chano was soon considered a boastful tough guy. Nevertheless, after his flashing success, he suddenly became one of the most elegant artists of that time who counseled his "buddies" to embark on the path of goodness. Even when some people would say he still liked to show off, he always had a melancholic attitude, as a remnant of those days when he was forced to earn his living as a hodman, bootblack, newsboy or simply as a street braggart.
When he was almost about to reach the summit of his career, Rita Montaner and Miguelito Valdés convinced him to go to the United States. When he arrived in this country, the mysterious force of destiny led him to an encounter with the renowned trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie at a night club. While Dizzy was playing touching melodies with his trumpet, Chano Pozo, as he did in Cuba, improvised with a tumbadora. That same night, the powerful and decisive rhythmic influence of Afro-Cuban music on jazz was born. But this was not enough. In the winter of 1947, when Gillespie hired the Cuban tamborero for a concert in Town Hall, the bop shivered when the beating of Chano´s callous hands evoked ancestral sonorities: the cubop or Afro-Cuban jazz had been born, and the name of Chano Pozo was written with golden letters in the annals of jazz.
On December 2, 1948, a few hours before the celebration of Changó´s Day, Guardian angel of Chano, the burning and hardened hands of the tamborero cooled down forever; the drums ceased to sound, the jazz and the Cuban music as a whole were in mourning. Chano Pozo passed away in a tragic and absurd way. The music had lost one of its top representatives.
