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Armando's Rhumba - Adam Rapa and CORNO Brass Ensemble

Armando’s Rhumba Fantasía is a very heartfelt homage to one of my greatest heroes, Chick Corea. About the ensemble: A whole-hearted “THANK YOU!” to the CORNO Brass Music Festival in Poland for the opportunity to perform this music with an ensemble of such high-caliber musicians. And “THANK YOU!” to all the amazing musicians whose skills brought this piece to life in a way that’s so deeply rewarding! Knowing I’ll have the pleasure to perform with them every year provides a great opportunity to create programs that are quite daring and artistically rewarding for this instrumentation, which I approach as a hybrid between an orchestral brass section and a big band. Being at the CORNO Festival in Zielona Góra is always one of my favorite times of the year. I highly recommend you come to the festival and see us live! (www.corno.pl) About the piece: When Chick Corea died last year (2021), I revisited his enormous discography and found so many gems that I’d previously missed. During that deep dive, I became inspired to work with some of his music, both to study it more deeply, and also to engage in a musical conversation that I hope he would have also enjoyed. One song that definitely spoke to me was Armando’s Rhumba. I’d been familiar with the original version from his 1976 album, “My Spanish Heart” since I was a child, but I’d missed a lot of the other versions he’d recorded over the next 40+ years in all sorts of contexts; whether solo piano, in duo or with other ensemble types. I found myself transcribing moments from at least 7 different versions - variations on the melody, individual phrases or longer sections of improvisation, bass lines, reharmonizations - whatever really stood out to me as something to reference while making an arrangement. From all of this foraging came what’s essentially a mini-concerto (with improvisation) for trumpet, with lots of space for a pianist, and plenty of fun material for a large ensemble to sink their teeth into as well. While my personal touch is pretty evident throughout the arrangement, this is mostly a faithful collage of Chick’s brilliant improvisations. Armando’s Rhumba is a theme that he clearly cared about a lot. It was an homage to his father, Armando, who happened to be a trumpet player and band leader in Boston. Being from Boston myself makes Chick not only a hero of mine, but a hometown hero as well. He was nearly the same age as my own Dad; they grew up in neighboring towns; both of southern Italian descent. Chick was even a trumpet/bugle soloist in a drum & bugle corps during his childhood — just like me! Of course, while all of these similarities are a delightful coincidence, it’s Chick’s music and his incredible generosity as a person and an educator that captured my utmost respect and adoration. Thus I’ve put a great deal of care into this piece, in loving tribute to one of the most influential Jazz musicians of all time. More about the structure of the piece: In the original version, Chick established a 3-way conversation between himself, Stanley Clarke on bass, and Jean-Luc Ponty on violin. I wanted to keep that 3-way conversational element going by sharing the focus between myself, a pianist and the large ensemble. While the arrangement takes many twists and turns, it’s also grounded and focused by this structural similarity to the original. Fans of Chick who are familiar with his original version, which has long been a Jazz standard, will find plenty of Easter eggs to enjoy throughout. Among my favorites are moments where I’ve taken some of his improvisations from the original and repurposed them for the ensemble, ensuring that his voice is ever-present. In the middle of the piece is a longer section of trumpet solo. Rather than improvising in this particular part, I chose to write something of a Jazz etude for other trumpet players to enjoy working on as well. Here I’m basically offering a response to a solo that Chick played in his duo recording with Gary Burton. While referencing the general shape and some important checkpoints in his solo, I’ve also made it my own by saying, “Yes, and you could also go this way.” The result is a page of phrases that are as fun as they are challenging. Anyone familiar with Chick’s solo piano versions on YouTube will also recognize a lot of material that I’ve used for the ensemble. In these solo versions, he had the freedom to go anywhere and allow his adventurous spirit to run wild on amazing new adventures. It was especially fun to transcribe and orchestrate these sections, which bring even deeper storytelling and added drama to the piece. I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I enjoyed making and performing it! Adam Rapa