Eddie Palmieri
Pianist Eddie Palmieri, 82, won the first Grammy for Best Latin Recording in 1975, almost a decade and a half after emerging from Puerto Rican parents who immigrated to the Bronx. At 14 – after performing at Carnegie Hall – he debuted his first group and over the next seven decades helped evolve Latin jazz and salsa into a dance craze famously fictionalized in 1992 film The Mambo Kings. Influenced by Thelonious Monk, McCoy Tyner, and his older brother Charlie Palmieri (1927-1988), he garnered another eight Grammys.
AC: When did you first come to Texas, and what were your initial impressions?
EP: My first visit in Texas was driving through it in the early Fifties heading to California, so you can imagine. The development in our great Republic – especially Texas – has been incredible.
AC: Why is el ritmo endemic to Latino culture?
EP: Rhythm is my pulse of life. In all musical genres, rhythm is the key element. For Afro-Caribbean music, the complexity of the rhythmical scales is the most complicated in my opinion. Most musicians are intrigued to utilize those rhythmical patterns in their presentation or orchestrations.
AC: Why is jazz still such a hard sell in this country?
EP: Jazz is the true art form of the United States just like Latin jazz was created in New York. The two art forms melded properly and have been accepted worldwide. However, the listening audiences over the years has changed and you must accept the flow and persevere.
AC: Some musicians sleep with their instruments. How does that sort of relationship work for a pianist?
EP: My brother, the late Charlie Palmieri, was my musical tour de force! When we were on the bandstand together – two pianos across from each other – we were in musical heaven.
– Raoul Hernandez