Bamboleo

Since the group's creation in 1995, Bamboleo has emerged as Havana's hottest timba group and has quickly earned a worldwide reputation for its dynamic original sound and stage presence. The 14-piece band is headed by pianist and arranger Lazaro Valdes and features four charismatic singers: Vannia Borges, Yordamis Megret, Alejandro Borreo, and Jorge David.

Bamboleo first came together when Lazaro Valdes decided he wanted to venture out on his own after having played with such notable figures as Hector Tellez, Bobby Carcasses, and Pachito Alonso (with whom he played for five years). Through Lazaro's funky style of playing the tumbaos, Bamboleo is set apart from other timba and contemporary Cuban music groups. Lazaro put together a band of very talented and well studied musicians — most of Bamboleo's band members are graduated from the National School of the Arts in Havana, each a master of his instrument — and found Haila Mompie, the band's original female vocalist who left Bamboleo in 1997.

It was Haila who discovered Vannia Borges while she was working with another band, and requested that she come rehearse with Bamboleo. Vannia immediately accepted this invitation and has since been considered la voz dulce — the "sweet voice" — of Bamboleo.

Vannia, originally from Havana, studied music from the age of 5 at the National School of Arts in Havana and graduated in 1989. She began her career in 1992 in a female quartet, D'capo, lead by Alina Torres, where she sang for four years. In 1996 Vannia sang with Pachito Alonso y su kini kini for a year and then joined Bamboleo in 1997. After auditioning several Cuban beauties to fill the void after Haila's departure, Bamboleo found Yordamis Megret — the perfect counterpart to Vannia Borges. Yordamis, originally from Guantanamo, began to study guitar at the age of 10 at Regino Eladio Boti in Guantanamo.

Bamboleo is the musical extension of songo, a vibrant sound created in the 1980s by Los Van Van. The new Cuban sound used the son as its foundation but fused electric instruments and R&B horns. As songo became the rage, it evolved into the more complex timba incorporating doses of funk, rap, and jazz-a fusion that is the band's powerful and aggressive trademark sound. —Courtesy Calabash Music