Kai Lyons had already sampled the sonic riches of Havana when a musical epiphany sent him back to an overlooked corner of Cuba.<\/p>\n
The San Francisco jazz guitarist was attending New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in 2017 when he happened upon a stage with vocalist Jos\u00e9 Andr\u00e9s \u201cEl Sinsonte\u201d Rodr\u00edguez. A master of chang\u00fc\u00ed, a style from Guant\u00e1namo that is rarely heard outside the region, he dazzled the audience with his facility as a reginero, freestyling verses full of wordplay over extended lines.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just fell in love with his music and went to Guant\u00e1namo to seek him out and study the tres,\u201d said Lyons, referring to the small Cuban guitar that\u2019s foundational to chang\u00fc\u00ed and son, the far better known Cuban tradition reintroduced to the world by the Buena Vista Social Club. \u201cHe\u2019s a key figure in chang\u00fc\u00ed who\u2019s very well known within the extremely niche genre.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lyons\u2019 quest proved successful, and the fruits of his repeated trips to Guant\u00e1namo manifest on Bay Area stages in the coming days. He plays two shows with El Sinsonte on vocals and percussion Sept. 2 at Mr. Tipple\u2019s<\/a> in Hayes Valley, where they\u2019ll be joined by Latin jazz maestro John Calloway on flute and piano. Propelling the band is the Santiago de Cuba rhythm section tandem of percussionist Einar \u201cTito\u201d Leliebre Nu\u00f1ez and bassist Ernesto Mazar Kindelan, the orchestra director at University High. \u201cLos Van Van offered him the bass position,\u201d Lyons said. \u201cBut he didn\u2019t want to move back to Cuba.\u201d<\/p>\n The same group, minus Calloway, plays the Red Door in Emeryville Sept. 3 and two shows at Meyhouse San Ramon Sept. 4<\/a>. Rodr\u00edguez and Lyons, who moves between tres and archtop jazz guitar, will be focusing on improvisation-laced chang\u00fc\u00ed while interspersing boleros and son for variety. They also perform duo at Bird & Beckett Books and Records Sept. 7<\/a>. It\u2019s an extremely rare opportunity to hear a master of a tradition that can be hard to find even in Havana.<\/p>\n Rodr\u00edguez earned renown in the Grupo Chang\u00fc\u00ed de Guant\u00e1namo, an ensemble that traces its roots back to 1945 when composer and musicologist Rafael Inciarte Brioso transformed rural folkloric fiesta music into an urban style with the standard instrumentation of tres, guayo or guiro, maracas, bongos and mar\u00edmbula (a cross between a caj\u00f3n and thumb piano).<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s one of few genres that uses mar\u00edmbula,\u201d Lyons said. \u201cYou can also sometimes find it in son jarocho from Veracruz, Puerto Rican plena, and mento in Jamaica. It serves the role of the bass, and was originally a cod fish box with a hole and some metal strips. It\u2019s got a kind of aquatic sound, tuned like low bass samba drums.<\/p>\n And the bongos aren\u2019t the ones you see in Buena Vista Social Club. It\u2019s bong\u00f3 del monte, which are bigger, and tuned and constructed differently.\u201d<\/p>\n Lyons\u2019 fateful encounter with Chang\u00fc\u00ed de Guant\u00e1namo was a stroke of luck, as it\u2019s one of the very few chang\u00fc\u00ed ensembles that has performed outside of Cuba. While he immersed himself in the style in Guant\u00e1namo, he didn\u2019t hang out with Rodr\u00edguez there. It wasn\u2019t until the pandemic shut down international travel that they really connected. Rodr\u00edguez had moved to Tampa to be near his daughter, \u201cand we developed a friendship talking on the phone for hours,\u201d Lyons said.<\/p>\n While Rodr\u00edguez had retired from performing, Lyons coaxed him out to the Bay Area with several gigs, starting with a 2025 concert at The Chapel produced by Bill Martinez that was part of a national campaign to raise money for solar generators, Let Cuba Live.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of my passions is to bring amazing Cuban musicians to the Bay Area, but the logistics governmentally to make that happen is really difficult,\u201d Lyons said. \u201cWhen Bill Martinez invited me to perform at the Chapel, I checked in with the members of the band and we used the money to fly Jos\u00e9 out.\u201d<\/p>\n