Chucho Valdes Performs at Camp Concert Hall

Chucho Valdes and the Afro-Cuban Messengers had bowed, waved to the audience and left the stage. But the crowd in the University of Richmond Camp Concert Hall was still standing, applauding and chanting for an encore.

Valdes let the audience stand in anticipation long enough that people started to file out of the orchestra seats. Then the band rewarded those who remained with another 15 minutes of Latin Jazz.

Chucho Valdes and the Afro-Cuban Messengers performed at the University of Richmond's Camp Concert Hall on Wednesday, Feb. 1. The enthusiasm of the crowd reflected the enthusiasm the band felt for the music. During each piece, the seven musicians exchanged smiles, nods and laughs.

Before the performance, audience member Janet Wilson said she had expected wonderful entertainment. Valdes has won five Grammy Awards and three Latin Grammy Awards, according to a biography provided by the Modlin Center.

Senior Kelly Gonsalves said she had attended the concert as part of her "Global Pop" music class. Her class assignment asked her to observe the audience's reaction, she said. She said she had noticed some people really knew the appropriate concert etiquette, such as clapping for solos, but others just went with the flow. In either case, she said she believed everyone had enjoyed the concert.

According to his biography, Valdes, the leader and pianist in the group, was born in Havana, Cuba. He is a composer, arranger and music professor. At 3, Valdes could play melodies he heard on the radio by ear and in any key. At 29, he debuted at the Jamboree International Jazz Festival in Poland, which was the first time a Cuban group participated in a jazz festival abroad, according to the biography.

In 1973, when he was 32, he founded the band Irakere, which, according to his biography, is widely recognized as the most important group in Cuban musical history in the second half of the 20th century.

In addition to being an accomplished musician, Valdes is also the goodwill ambassador for the Food and Agricultural Association of the United Nations, according to the biography.

"This was a great opportunity for the students and community to come especially [students] for free," Gonsalves said. She said she had most enjoyed the way the music styles changed throughout the concert and had kept her attention.

Audience member Flossie Segal, a professor emeritus at Virginia Commonwealth University, said she had come, to see Valdes because she was a longtime lover of jazz, as far back as to when she was growing up in New York listening to Big Band music.

Segal's friend Jean Gasen, a business professor at VCU, said she also had attended the concert because of her enthusiasm for music.

"I love listening to music that we don't get to hear in Richmond very often," Gasen said.

Segal and Gasen said that they had both been to musical performances at the Modlin Center before and had enjoyed the concerts.

"The venue is such a pleasure," said Segal.

At the last concert they attended there, the audience was excited and moving to the music, Segal and Gasen said. The two said they had discovered music that left them smiling and on their feet.

Contact reporter Chrissy Wengloski at christine.wengloski@richmond.edu.