Luis “Perico” Ortiz: 55 years of Music

Behind many great songs and albums during the golden years of Salsa, you may find Luis “Perico” Ortiz.

As the Puerto Rican music man celebrates the coveted 55-year milestone in the music business, he recently gave a great concert in New York City, which he calls his second home.

Luis “Perico” Ortiz brought great orchestrations to Salsa music. That was after polishing his musical knowledge with the great ones. First with the Puerto Rico Symphonic Orchestra under the maestro Pablo Casals. Later, with Mongo Santamaría’s Afro-Cuban Jazz band. And finally, working with other greats like Tony Bennett.

Perico’s Music

His music always had this big band flare that had a rich, melodic sound. As a performer his band always sounded good and released multiple hits, like “Julian Del Valle”, “Alabao”, “De Patitas”, “Tin Marín”, “Río Abajo Va” and “Más Amor” among many others.

A blog about this great musician from Santurce, Puerto Rico (from where many great musicians have come from, like Ismael Rivera, Andy Montanez, Daniel Santos, Danny Rivera, and Julio Rodriguez), would take several pages.

Instead, I’m attaching an excellent interview article by a Puerto Rican newspaper which covers important highlights of the career of Luis “Perico” Ortiz.

Happy 55th anniversary Maestro!

Enjoy!

Luis “Perico” Ortiz: sobrevive la fama y apuesta a más música