Plena Libre founder Gary Nunez is as full of joy and life as the music that he and his band perform. Nominated for a 2006 Latin Grammy for "Best Traditional Tropical Album", Nunez took a moment to talk about Plena Libre, Evolucion and a philosophy that's brought him music, laughter and a strong feeling of life's priorities.
The name of your new album is Evolucion. Does that name have any special significance?
At the beginning of 2005, Plena Libre had already completed the first 10 year cycle. Our last album [Estamos Gozando] was a tenth anniversary album. It was sort of a history, a compilation of the history of plena. It had tunes starting from the beginning of the 20th century up until today, like a summary, a history of composers and singers. And then, that record finishes up with a medley of two of the hits of Plena Libre from our first album in ’94.
So, when I started work on Evolucion, I wanted to make some changes in the sound, I wanted to sort of throw it all away and build it up again. For me, it was like an evolution. I’ve got to go back to the drawing board and figure out how I can turn the music around without losing the essence of what Plena Libre is. What came out was this record.
Let me tell you something about this album that made it very special. I have a great group of musicians. We worked on this album between tours. It was great because we had a chance to play these tunes hard before we got into the studio. I am the arranger of all the tunes, but when you play the tunes for awhile, everybody starts to sneak in their personal signature. And then, it becomes something different. Its still my arrangement, but every musician makes the arrangement their own, and that creates a new sound, and a great experience. Its like the sum of the parts is equal to more than the whole. So I’m very happy with the album, and I’m very grateful to the musicians for making it a great experience.
So, you previously had a band, Moliendo Vidrio, which played Nueva Cancion. Why did you decide to focus primarily on plena?
You see, projects have a lifeline. I don’t know if that’s going to happen to Plena Libre. Actually my hope is that Plena Libre will become something like a Gran Combo. But then again, my view on life is that change is what really rules life. What happened with Moliendo Vidrio is that it lasted longer than it needed to. I have only myself to blame for that. There’s nobody else I can point to and say “It’s your fault”. It served its purpose, and we made two or three albums that are classics in Puerto Rican music. It was a very important band, and when it started, there were not many young cuatro players (I played it myself). And now you’ve got a new generation of cuadristas and I don’t know whether to say its my pride or my fault that it happened, but I think we contributed so much to that happening, as we brought the instrument to the forefront. And also, the country music to Puerto Rico. As opposed to the plena / bomba, although I recorded a couple of plena of mine with that band. I think it was natural. It was life. It came to an end. I needed a break in order to do different stuff. I was a little bit tired of doing what I was doing so I thought well, here it goes, I’m not going to do this anymore. I’m going to be without a job for a little while and see what comes up.
And look what a great thing came up!
Yeah, I’m very happy with it, you know? Actually, I’m many times greatful.
