My Sax Life: A Memoir

Front Cover
Northwestern University Press, Nov 4, 2008 - Biography & Autobiography - 400 pages

Winner of 2005 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition
Winner of 2005 National Medal of Arts

Since defecting from Cuba in 1980—and indeed long before that in his native land— Paquito D'Rivera has received glowing praise time and again. A best-selling artist with more than thirty solo albums to his credit, D'Rivera has performed at the White House and the Blue Note, and with orchestras, jazz ensembles, and chamber groups around the world. My Sax Life is the English-language edition of D'Rivera's memoirs, published to acclaim in 1998. Propelled by jazz-fueled high spirits, D'Rivera's story soars and spins from memory to memory in a collage of his remarkable life. D'Rivera recalls his early nightclub appearances as a child, performing with clowns and exotic dancers, as well as his search for artistic freedom in communist Cuba and his hungry explorations of world music after his defection. Opinionated but always good-humored, My Sax Life is a fascinating statement on art and the artist's life.

 

Contents

MUSIC AND MUSICIANS
3
1959
55
JAZZ
81
THE ARMY
121
THE ORQUESTA CUBANA DE MÚSICA MODERNA
149
IRAKERE
197
FASTEN YOUR SEAT BELTS
221
VARADEROMARIEL
261
THE CALL OF THE JUNGLE
315
THE QUEEN AND HER KNIGHT
333
CUBA ON THE BANKS OF THE HUDSON
341
CODA
345
FINAL CHORD
349
INDEX
353
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
375
Copyright

MADRIDNEW YORK
281

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About the author (2008)

Paquito D'Rivera was born in 1948 in Havana, Cuba. His celebrated recordings include the Grammy-winning Historia del Soldado (2003), Brazilian Dreams (2003), Live at the Blue Note (2001), and Portraits of Cuba (1996). D'Rivera is celebrating his fiftieth year as a performer in 2004 with concerts throughout the world and culminating with a special celebration at Carnegie Hall in January 2005. He lives in North Bergen, New Jersey. Ilan Stavans (born Ilan Stavchansky on April 7, 1961, in Mexico City) is a Mexican-American, essayist. He is the author of "The Hispanic Condition", "The Riddle of Cantinflas", and "The One-Handed Pianist & Other Stories" as well as the editor of "The Oxford Book of Jewish Stories" and a dictionary of Spanglish, among other volumes. He has been a National Book Critics Circle Award nominee, the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Latino Literature Prize, among other honors. He teaches at Amherst College.