Jazz Notes: Eddie Palmieri, innovator of Afro-Caribbean music dies at 88

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Eddie Palmieri, the percussive pianist, bandleader, composer, and arranger who expanded the concept of Latin music while restructuring the sound of New York City’s salsa landscape, died on Aug. 6 at his home in Hackensack, N.J. He was 88.

The New York Times confirmed via his youngest daughter, Gabriela Palmieri, that his death came after “an extended illness.”

During his career, Palmieri earned distinction as an NEA Jazz Master, with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Latin Recording Academy and recipient of 10 Grammy Awards. In the early 1990s, he introduced vocalist La India with the album “Llegó La India via Eddie Palmieri” (“La India has arrived via Eddie Palmieri”) (Soho Sounds1992). She has since become one of the famous Latina voices after the great Gracella and Cecila Cruz.

Palmieri consistently explored new terrain. In 1994, recording without vocalists, he featured two former Art Blakey Jazz Messengers — trumpeter Brian Lynch and alto saxophonist Donald Harrison — on the album “Palmas.” The Province labeled the album “infectious African-Caribbean music with unmistakable jazz roots.” Harrison commented during a phone interview, “I affectionately called him ‘The Maestro.’ Eddie Palmieri shared immense love and understanding with his musicians and audiences, spreading joy, truth, and the vision of a better humanity worldwide.”

Palmieri tailored his own sound by employing a jazz esthetic based on the Cuban “descarga” (jam session) concept. Like Thelonious Monk and Horace Silver, he engaged creative musicians and allowed them to play inside out while he intuitively played in their kaleidoscope of rhythms. His ensemble, Conjunto La Perfecta, founded in 1961, was one of the first Latin bands to feature multiple trombones for a heavier, more in-depth sound, a thunderous characteristic of salsa music. Key La Perfecta members included mainstay vocalist Ismael Quintana, trombonist Barry Rogers, and the wood flute of George Castro. Palmieri debuted “La Perfecta” (self-titled) in 1962 (Alegre).

Throughout the 1960s, Palmieri was influential in the development of the New York City salsa scene. The pianist’s boisterous trombones and high-flyin’ flute transformed the Latin dance crazes of the cha cha, mambo, charanga, and Pachanga into a more energetic salsa dance style; grooving with fast-paced steps, intense swings, and outrageous turns all done with effortless finesse. That big salsa sound and hypnotic dance moves had the Bronx blazing — it was the place for swingers to be; Palmieri and many Latin musicians were raised and resided in the borough. The hardcore salsa dancers made their way downtown to the Palladium, then the salsa mecca; similar to Harlem’s Savoy Ballroom, the earlier mecca for the acrobatic lindy-hop.

Salsa’s South Bronx birthplace had an abundance of music venues, like Hunts Point Palace, Longwood Casino, Carlton Terrace, Colgate Gardens, and Concourse Plaza. It was where residents, and teenagers like myself, could see Palmieri with La Perfecta, his older brother Charlie (also a pianist), along with ensembles led by Willie Colon, Ray Baretto, and Manny Oquendo.

By 1965, the whispers of Palmieri’s innovative genius had turned to shouts as his definitive album “Azucar Pa’ Ti (Sugar for You)” was released on Tico Records. It was his most successful recording and while all seven tracks were gems, the 8-minute track “Azucar” became and remains the national salsa anthem. Palmieri’s intense percussive solo was one of the best-ever recorded; with Rogers’s raging trombone and soaring flute, the invigorating vocals of Quintana and Oquendo on timbales and bongo, “Azucar” clouded the dance floor like an improvisational explosion of Latin funk and when the smoke cleared, they were still dancing. To this day, La Perfecta and La Perfecta II (with whom he recorded the CD “Ritmo Caliente (Hot Rhythm) are known as one of the most innovative instrumental danceable groups of its era.

As a teenager living in the east Bronx, it was mandatory to have a few albums under your arm if you considered yourself to be cool. The compulsory list had to include Miles Davis, Cal Tjader, and Eddie Palmieri’s “Azucar” (just to prove, or at least front, that your salsa moves were in full effect, which you could be obligated to perform on request). In 2009, the track was added to the National Recording Registry as a landmark of American culture.

During his success with La Perfecta, Palmieri collaborated with the popular West Coast Latin jazz-engrossed vibraphonist Cal Tjader; together, they released two noteworthy albums: “El Sonido Nuevo” (Verve 1966) and “Bamboleate” (Tico 1967). They were the perfect Latin jazz duo, leaning in for intense solos on the track “Picadillo” and easy sailing on traveled standards like “We’ve Loved Before.” Although both albums displayed a West Coast coolness, Palmieri’s fiery flair was consistent throughout.

He was an intense, percussive pianist. He told me during an interview some years ago, “I am a frustrated drummer. I love piano, but somewhere in my mind, I hear those drum beats.” Influenced by pianist McCoy Tyner, he made use of his chord voicings in fourths, which became Palmieri’s signature sound. He later joined forces with seasoned trumpeter and band member Brian Lynch to record the Artistshare CD release “The Brian Lynch/Eddie Palmieri Project: Simpático” (2005).

“Eddie Palmieri stretched the boundaries of music theory, broke through musical nationalism, uniting instead of dividing Latino communities while stretching racial limits of cultural and sonic identities,” said journalist and Latina music historian Aurora Flores Hostos. (You can find her Salsa Diaries on Substack.)

Eduardo Palmeri was born on Dec. 15, 1936, in the borough of the [South] Bronx, where his mother, Isabel Maldonado Palmieri, a seamstress, and his father, Carlos Palmieri, who owned an ice cream parlor, settled after moving from Ponce, Puerto Rico, in 1926. His older brother, Charlie Palmieri, was also born in the Bronx.

Eddie began studying the piano at an early age, like his brother Charlie. The two often participated in local talent shows, but at age 13, Eddie started playing timbales in his uncle’s orchestra, although he eventually returned to playing piano. He was influenced by Monk and Tyner, and inspired by his big brother Charlie, who was playing with elite Latin bands led by Tito Rodriguez and Vincentico Valdes. Charlie later formed his own band called Charanga La Duboney, which gave Eddie even more incentive to one day have his own band.

Palmieri attended P.S. 52 in the South Bronx. Ironically, the school was an incubator for soon-to-be exceptional Latin musicians like Nicky Marrero, Johnny Pacheco, Orlando Marin, and Joe Torres. The school also held weekly dances. They all lived in the same close-knit Puerto Rican and Black community, and often hung out at the local candy store El Mambo (named by Eddie), owned by his father. The thriving neighborhood was also home to the noted Casalegre and Casa Amadeo record stores.

During the 1950s,while still a teenager, Palmieri played in varied bands, including Eddie Forrester, Johnny Segui, and the Tito Rodriguez Orchestra.

In 1971, Palmieri recorded “Vamonos Pa’l Monte” (“Let’s Go to the Mountain”) with his brother Charlie playing organ (Charlie died in 1988). That same year, he also recorded “Eddie Palmieri & Friends in Concert, at the University of Puerto Rico.” With his unconventional percussive approach to playing piano and constant search for new music, he formed the ensemble Harlem River Drive, which was a combination of Black and Latin patterns that encompassed elements of salsa, funk, soul, and jazz. Their first self-titled album was released in 1971 (Roulette), followed by two volumes of “Recorded Live at Sing Sing” on Tico Records, released in 1972 and ’74 respectively. In 1975, Palmieri won his first Grammy Award for Best Latin Recording for “The Sun of Latin Music” with singer Lalo Rodríguez. Palmieri released the album “Masterpiece” in 2000, teaming up with the legendary Tito Puente, who died that year. The album won two Grammy Awards.

Palmieri was a composer, musical stargazer, visionary, agitator, and mentor in boundless pursuit, who influenced generations of musicians. He was a cultural warrior, who accepted his role as a Nuyorican, Puerto Rican to carry on the tradition of Latin music in his own inventive fashion. He recorded over 40 albums, and played well into his octogenarian years.

Palmieri didn’t care for the word “salsa.” He described his music as “Afro-Cuban,” he said in a 2012 interview with the Smithsonian Oral History Project. Through the participation of Puerto Ricans and Nuyoricans like himself, he explained, it had become “Afro-Caribbean. And now it’s Afro-world.”

Palmieri is survived by Gabriela and three other daughters, Renee, Eydie, and Ileana; a son, Edward Palmieri II; and four grandchildren. He was predeceased by his wife of 58 years, Iraida (González) Palmieri, who died in 2014.