Musical Style
Using a charanga line-up (flute, string instruments, and rhythm section) as its base, Los Van Van added trombones, and was the first Cuban group to use synthesizers and drum machines. Initially, their sound was a fusion of son montuno, rumba, and North American rock and pop. Later Van Van incorporated funk, disco, and hip hop.
Los Van Van has consistently managed to adapt its style to the times, and remains, after 35 years, Cuba's most popular dance band. Along with pianist Cesar "Pupy" Pedroso, Juan Formell has written some of the most intriguing verses in popular dance music, including stories that run over several albums and, contrary to trends in timba, all types of social commentary. Both artists are undisputed masters of double-entendre in a musical culture where multiple meanings in lyrics are pervasive. Indeed, the title of the band is probably meant to evoke the novel and compelling rhythms of the new sound of Formell's band, as van in Spanish means 'they go' and so the name of the band could be translated as 'those they go, they go' (it has also been suggested to translate as their name as something like the go-gos!). When Cesar "Pupy" Pedroso, their pianist and founding member, left the band in 2002 he founded his own band Pupy y los que son son, which is likely a name with a triple-entendre. The word son can mean both 'they are' and also refers to the traditional music son, originating in the eastern provinces of Cuba, from which modern salsa takes its form. The third meaning, is of course a reference back to his roots in Van Van.
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Famous quotes containing the words musical and/or style:
“Creative force, like a musical composer, goes on unweariedly repeating a simple air or theme, now high, now low, in solo, in chorus, ten thousand times reverberated, till it fills earth and heaven with the chant.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“His style is eminently colloquial, and no wonder it is strange to meet with in a book. It is not literary or classical; it has not the music of poetry, nor the pomp of philosophy, but the rhythms and cadences of conversation endlessly repeated.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)