Poll Results; Favorite Duo of El Gran Combo
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Charlie & Jerry are the favorite duo of El Gran Combo singers for the majority of Salsa fan who voted in the Latino Music Café poll.
But to understand the results, perhaps we should consider two other factors that may have influenced the voting; years the duo were together, and albums they recorded together.
Let’s take a look, but not before I say thank you for participating in the poll!
Your Favorite Duo of El Gran Combo Singers
By far the favorite duo for the voters of the Latino Music Café poll was the duo of Charlie Aponte and Jerry Rivas. They got 52% of the votes. They were followed by Pellin Rodriguez and Andy Montañez, who got 30% of the votes, and then Andy & Charlie, who got 17%.
Nobody voted for Jerry Rivas and Anthony Garcia as their favorite duo of El Gran Combo.
But is that fair for Jerry & Anthony? They have only been together for 5 years.
Let’s take a look at how much time these duos spent together.
El Gran Combo Duos; Years Together
It turns out that the 5 years Jerry & Anthony have been together is one year more than Andy & Charlie were together, and they still got 17% of the votes.
Pellin & Andy were together 11 years, while Charlie & Jerry were together for 37 years.
Let’s see how many years each duo spent together, as a percentage of the 58 years El Gran Combo has been active.
Albums Recorded by Duo
Jerry & Anthony have only recorded one album in the 5 years they’ve been together. However, Andy & Charlie recorded 5 albums in their 4 years together. Two of those 5 albums were Christmas albums, which means every Christmas some of those songs come back to life.
The 5 albums recorded by Andy & Charlie represent 7% of the total albums released by El Gran Combo. The only album recorded by Jerry & Anthony represent over 1% of the albums released by El Gran Combo. Perhaps that is why nobody picked them as their favorite duo. By the way, that doesn’t mean nobody likes them; just that they are not their favorite.
Here’s how the percent of albums each duo recorded out of the total of 67 albums released by El Gran Combo.
As you can see, Charlie & Jerry recorded 51% of all the albums released by El Gran Combo, and 52% of you picked them as your favorite. Pellin & Andy were in 39% of the albums, including several compilations.
So perhaps the % of albums the duos have released together has more weight for who you pick as your favorite duo than the years they were together.
Conclusions of Latino Music Café Poll
One key element I didn’t have in demographic. If many more of voters were of the older demographic, they will remember the older duos, particularly with fonder memories than the current duo.
Regardless of all the data, for me it comes down to two things:
The more albums you record, the more memorable you’ll be in the minds of music fans. Charlie & Jerry spent more time together and recorded more albums together than any of the other duos. They were selected as your favorite duo in about the same proportion as the percent of albums they recorded with El Gran Combo.
The other insight I got from this poll is that if El Gran Combo wants to make their current duo (or trio) of singers (Jerry, Anthony & Joselito) more appealing to the Salseros, they need to get more recordings out and fast.
Andy & Charlie recorded 5 albums in the 4 years after Pellin left. They also recorded 5 albums in the 5 years after Andy left. But since Charlie left, they’ve only recorded one album.
It turns out that El Gran Combo has only released one album in the last 6 years (from 2014 to 2019). This is the slowest recording period in their history, precisely when they should be doing the opposite with a new singer on board.
If currently El Gran Combo can’t get full albums out every year, for whatever reasons, perhaps they can get some EP’s out every year with 3-4 songs each. This way they will keep releasing new material at a rapid pace, and their new duo would be more memorable for Salsa fans.
Thanks for your participation in the poll!