The Reverend Will the Thrill Presents the Album of the Week!

Hey, there!  Hope everyone had a good holiday season.  Every year, just before the holidays, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts awards a special honor to five (usually) people who have made a special contribution to the arts.  Over the years, the Kennedy Center Honors have been awarded to the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, Robert DeNiro, Harry Belafonte, Paul Newman, Dave Brubeck, Alvin Ailey, Johnny Cash, LL Cool J, Mel Brooks, Bruce Springsteen, Georg Solti, Stephen Sondheim, and Queen Latifah... just to name a (very) few.  Around the holidays, CBS broadcasts the big ceremony and I look forward to it every year.  Part of me enjoys geeking out over the artists I like, but I also like learning about those I'm not too familiar with--usually one a year, usually a dancer or an opera singer.

This year was special in that I was actually familiar with--and a fan of--all the honorees.  This year, the Honor was given to Bonnie Raitt, Francis Ford Coppola, Arturo Sandoval, The Grateful Dead, and Harlem's famed Apollo Theater--marking the first time the Honor was given to a non-human.  I kind of wanted to focus on one of those (human) artists because I thought something got left out that has fascinated me for more than twenty years. 

Arturo Sandoval grew up in Communist Cuba where he learned to play many instruments, but ended up focusing primarily on the trumpet.  He took classical lessons for three years at the Cuban National School of Arts, where he became part of Cuba's all-star national band.  He became one of the most beloved trumpet players, not just in Cuba but worldwide.  He toured all over in the 1980s, particularly with the legendary Dizzy Gillespie, who became his lifelong friend.  In 1989, Gillespie invited Sandoval to join the United Nations Orchestra.  While touring with them in Greece, Sandoval--accompanied by Gillespie--visited the American Embassy in Athens, where Gillespie helped him defect from Cuba to the States, eventually becoming an American citizen in 1998.  In the years since, he's performed with more notable orchestras and groups than I can list here, and the Kennedy Center Honor is only the latest of many awards and accolades he's received during that time.  Most notably, he received a Primetime Emmy Award for the score to a television movie about his life titled For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story starring Andy Garcia as Sandoval.

Like most people, when I think of Arturo Sandoval, I think of the trumpet.  It's hard not to equate the two.  So imagine my surprise to discover some years back that he had released an album of piano music.  I had no clue he played the piano.  (As I write this, I'm quite pleased to discover he plays timbales as well--I'll have to see what I can dig up on that.)  At the time I discovered this little tidbit, I was kind of pleasantly taken aback.  It was like finding out that Al Hirt could play the harpsichord. *  It's a delightful discovery that makes me like him even more.

But I think the fact that he can play something other than the trumpet has been overlooked over time.  I don't remember it being mentioned during the Kennedy Center Honors broadcast.  So to make up for that, this week, I present the incomparable Arturo Sandoval with his 2002 album My Passion For the Piano, on which he not only plays amazing piano, but composed half of the album's songs.

Until next week, stay safe, be good to your neighbours, and Happy Burns Night!

Yours in peace, love, and rock and roll!  Slàinte Mhath!

The Reverend Will the Thrill

* He didn't... as far as I know.