YERBABUENA: Boricua Roots Music

YERBABUENA Boricua ("Puerto Rican") Roots Music A new Boricua generation is embracing their traditional musical expressions. The work of Tato Torres & YERBABUENA is the product of everything that leads to a contemporary Puerto Rican musical experience. While well-recognized Boricuas like Willie Colón, Marc Anthony and Ricky Martin are known worldwide for their "Latin" flavor, groups like Plena Libre, Los Pleneros de la 21, Viento de Agua, and now YERBABUENA, have been changing the way people listen to traditional Puerto Rican music in New York City and beyond. The last thing that will come to your mind while at a YERBABUENA event is that you're watching a show, it feels more like a cross between a jam in the park, a spiritual ceremony and a family reunion. They convey wholeness and harmony, and their music is moving beyond belief. The music they play is, by nature, participatory. Whether bomba, plena or música jíbara, it's all interactive. And being witness to their vibrant sounds and the deep joy that making music together gives them, just leaves the audience no choice but to join in the chorus or dance for the drums. After a YERBABUENA session, you'll be uplifted, tired and happy. YERBABUENA reclaims the Puerto Rican music often branded as "folkloric," refusing to accept its packaging as frozen-in-time museum pieces, only vaguely connected to contemporary culture. Instead, they make gorgeous music that incorporates past and present. YERBABUENA taps right into the core of who Boricuas are as a People. PRESS: "Yo necesitaba este disco y ahora que lo tengo soy más feliz." — Ramón López, herencialatina.com ““YERBABUENA specializes and entertains with hip-moving, authentic music culturally dug from Puerto Rico and the Caribbean. The passionate band plays original urban (jíbaro) hillbilly style Bomba, Plena and Lelolay. This is folk songs containing percussive and deep electric-bass grooves with a contemporary twist."” — Ruthy Ferrera, examiner.com "Like nothing you've ever heard before, and yet like everything that leads to a contemporary Puerto Rican musical... like our parents record collection on our turntables... " — Sentimiento Manana "There is mystery and uncertainty with everything regarding Puerto Rican culture. The world is experimenting a new awakening in which old standards and assumptions are being questioned, specifically those about Puerto Rico and our culture. Yerbabuena is just lucky enough to be in the eye of the storm, and, therefore, people are more receptive to our music and message...(-Tato)" — Laura Ortiz-Meléndez, LatinPulseMusic.com "A Nuyorican Tour de Force" — Sasha Lee Alvarez, REMEZCLA.com The OFFICIAL page for YERBABUENA - Boricua Roots Music for a New Millenium