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Best Musical Rejuvenation

Luis Bofill

An artist's muse can be tricky to pin down. It's easy to recognize when a musician is in touch with it, drawing on some vibrant inner force. But what exactly causes that creative well to run dry? Fans of the singer and original Grupo Nostalgia band leader Luis Bofill have spent the better part of the past year or so pondering that very question. It was in no small part Bofill's soulful crooning -- as suited to a slow-burning ballad as to a growling, hip-grinding son workout -- that made Grupo Nostalgia's initial weekend residency at Little Havana's Café Nostalgia the local spot for serious fans of Latin music. And it's a credit to the rhythmic chops of all concerned that long after Bofill had settled into essentially going through the onstage motions, audiences still turned up to hear whatever new assemblage he was fronting. (Though that also speaks to many Miamians' desperate hunger for a Saturday-night alternative to clubland's canned beats.) But a funny thing happened on the way to Washed-up-ville: Without any advance fanfare, Bofill put together a new outfit, Cuba Libre (featuring several familiar faces), and adopted a decidedly new attitude. Just what precipitated this return to form is unclear, but as Cuba Libre's recent Friday-night performances at Coral Gables' Giacosa demonstrate, Bofill is back, and serving some of the hottest grooves around.

Best Local Latin Band

Andres Juliao y Sus Vallenatos

Growing up in Atlanta, Georgia, Andres Juliao did not have much opportunity to hear the accordion. It was only when he visited his family in Barranquilla that he came to appreciate the sound that is the backbone of vallenato, one of the many traditional musical genres of Colombia's Atlantic coast. He began studying the accordion four years ago. Two years later he rounded up a number of veteran Colombian folklore musicians living in Miami to form his own vallenato group here featuring singer Poti Lozana, Tayrol Carrillo on caja or box, Leo Ceballos on guacharaca, Francisco Prieto on bass, Mario Lozano on congas, and Hermides Benitez on timbales. Andres Juliao and his Vallenatos also play cumbia and contemporary vallenato-pop, but the accordionist says he still prefers classics such as "La Gota Fria." Carlos Vives, who made "La Gota Fria" an international hit, has been known to sit in at gigs around town, but even without the charismatic star, this exuberant ensemble more than holds its own.

Best Use Of A High School Marching Band

Trick Daddy's "Shut Up"

Can you define Southern rap? We mean beyond the obvious identifier of being made by rappers raised in the South. (Gee, thanks, professor!) Is there a telltale sign, an ingredient that makes a song undeniably from below the Mason-Dixon Line? Well, forget about drawled accents, thugged-out attitudes, or even a propensity to rap about barbecue. Miami's own Trick Daddy hit the gritty cultural nail on the head when he recreated the fat tubas and whoop-ass trombones of a Miami hard-stepping high school marching band, providing a unique low end for his "Shut Up" single. The result is irresistible, head-snapping funk that couldn't have come from anywhere else. For the tune's accompanying video, Trick even went one better: That's Northwestern High's own Marching Bulls strutting down the field. It's all about the Benjamins? Maybe in New York. Here in the Magic City, it's all about high school football, baby.

Best Local Latin Rock Band

Bacilos

No man is a prophet in his hometown. So maybe that's why in six years of gigging like crazy all over town, pan-Latin rockers Bacilos registered nary a mention in New Times. Now that they're off to greener pastures, touring Latin America for the Miami-based WEA Latina label, the trio of Colombian-born frontman Jorge Villamizar, Brazilian-born bass player Andre Lopes, and Puerto Rican drummer JJ Freire is sorely missed. The University of Miami alums were staples at the Marlin, Churchill's, Tobacco Road, and the celebrated Stephen Talkhouse. Their self-titled, self-produced release is a document of those years, capturing the energy of the band's live shows and hinting at the range of Villamizar's songwriting craft. His vocal skills are impressively versatile as well, whether warbling on the heartbreaker "Soledad," warning of environmental destruction on "There Goes the Wood," or packing a political punch on "Chronicle of an Announced Immigration." If it's true, as they sing, that now everybody wants Taco Bell, Bacilos' fusion of Latin folk traditions with good old rock and roll is just the antidote for homogenized Latin pop.

Best Concert Of The Past Twelve Months

The Shirley Horn Trio

An evening of exquisite understatement began when pianist-vocalist Shirley Horn took the stage at the Coral Gables Congregational Church and caressed the keyboard as she hadn't in Miami since the late Eighties. Joined by drummer Steve Williams and bassist Charles Ables, the 66-year-old Horn was touring in support of her album I Remember Miles. The Miles mentioned in the title was trumpet titan Miles Davis, who 40 years earlier had heard her album Embers and Ashes and lured Horn from her Washington, D.C., home to New York City. Subsequently she often opened for him at the Village Vanguard and carved out a career, which she relinquished a few years later for motherhood. Her piano chops remained, however, and when she and Davis reunited for her 1990 album You Won't Forget Me, it was as if they had never left each other's side. Even without her friend Miles, who has been gone for nine years, Horn proved that night in Coral Gables she could still astonish with her elegant piano styling, velvet voice, and serene presence. As she closed the show with a relaxed rendition of Butler and Molinary's wistful ode "Here's to Life," the awestruck audience realized at that very moment that life couldn't be any better.

Best Latin Radio Program

Saturday Night Fever

Another lonely Saturday night? Tune into to Edwin "El Huracan" Bautista's dance program on Classica 92 from 7:00 p.m. to midnight and connect to dozens of Latin house parties happening all over Miami. For two years Bautista has been building a steady following with an intoxicating mix of salsa, merengue, and disco guaranteed to move the most stubborn booty. Bautista squeezes Donna Summer classics between old-school Latin jams by the likes of Sonora Poncena and the original Fania All Stars. "I play salsa with descargas, instrumental jams that none of the other stations play because they are too long," he says. "I don't care. I play it in my show, and people love it."

Best Concert Series

Rhythm Foundation

Not even Hurricane Debby could rain out the Rhythm Foundation, the organization that for thirteen years has brought the very best in world music to Miami. When a twenty-minute downpour drenched the North Shore Community Bandshell in Miami Beach where Brazilian artists Chico Cesar and Rita Ribeiro were scheduled to perform last August, the artists improvised an intimate two-hour acoustic set in the adjacent community center for the fans who braved the storm to hear forro music. Like so many Rhythm Foundation events, the Chico Cesar show was a Florida premiere, as was the spectacular moonlit show by Afro-Colombian pioneer Totó La Momposina and the mesmerizing North American debut of the Whirling Dervishes of Damascus. Concerts range from the educational presentation of folklore at the Dominican Youth Arts Festival to the awe-inspiring bossa nova revival of Marisa Monte to the experimental cross-cultural collaboration between composer Philip Glass and West African griot and kora virtuoso Foday Musa Suso. Without the Rhythm Foundation, Miami would be a quieter, less vibrant place.

Best Syndicated Jazz Radio Program

88 Jazz Place Overnight Session with Bob Parlocha

For night owls who like their jazz straight-ahead with no frothy filler, Bob Parlocha's show is as bracing as a shot of espresso. Saxophonist and record producer Parlocha brews an eye-opening dose of bebop and a smattering of contemporary interpretations by the masters from 11:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. weekdays. Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, and Charlie Parker classics bounce alongside sides from contemporary greats Kenny Burrell, Jack DeJohnette, and Terence Blanchard. Although his show is beamed from San Francisco via satellite to more than 220 North American cities, Parlocha has a knack for creating an intimate setting. Subtle drum strokes, calm horns, and wild pianos can transport listeners to dark and smoky jazz dives of days gone by. Listen closely and imagine muffled conversations and tinkling highballs. "I want to take people out of their surroundings," Parlocha says. "If I can get them in a club in 1969, that's perfect. Jazz is the best of the human race -- it's our best hour."

Best Local Songwriter

Rafelito Marerro

Beloved Dominican television host Rafelito Marerro began his career at age four, dancing rumba with the voluptuous starlet Tongolele in the Fifties. In the Sixties he earned the nickname "pampered child of Dominican society," for his talk shows featuring international stars. In the past decade, he made his way to the radio airwaves in Boston as a host. At his house there, a prominent composer visiting from Puerto Rico found one of his verses in a drawer and told him he must dedicate himself to song. The moving ballads he has composed since have garnered awards across the United States. He moved to Miami just in time to win the grand prize in the Latin category of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest 2000 for his tune "Anoche Soñé" ("Last Night I Dreamed"). Aptly Marerro's neoclassical love songs are the stuff dreams are made of.

Best Piano Man

Paquito Hechavarria

Paquito Hechavarria has played and recorded with everyone from bassist Israel "Cachao" Lopez to vocalists Gloria Estefan and Christina Aguilera ("You know, she doesn't speak any Spanish"). Back in the old days, he played with Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr., at the Fontainebleau. Currently he sits behind the baby grand at the Deauville five nights a week, pounding out standards, Latin jazz, and pop with equal parts perspiration and inspiration. The man is so good he's not only the winner for this category; he's the first three runners-up.

Best Of Miami®

Best Of Miami®

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