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For many years now, Gonzalo Rubalcaba has been considered on of the great stars on the international jazz scene. Herbie Hancock described him as the first Jazz pianist to open the door to the 21st century. The Jazz of pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba, who lives in New York, is clearly influenced and inspired by the rhythmic energies of Cuban music traditions which, in turn, are rooted in the Afro-Cuban Santeria religion.
His father, Guillermo Rubalcaba, was an outstanding pianist. Gonzalo himself studied piano and percussion at one of Havana's renowned conservatories and toured Europe and Africa with the famous salsa band Orquesta Aragon. During the late 1980s, he increasingly turned to jazz. Not long afterwards he moved to the USA, where he began working with the famous Blue Note label. Thanks to their co-operation, he was rewarded with numerous prizes and honours, including two Grammys in 2002 alone. He is currently considered the best Latin jazz pianist. Paul Gilroy describes his improvisations as 'creole modernism', and calls him "the greatest ever improvising pianist in the history of what gets called 'jazz'".
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