Atabal

ATABAL GRUPO

San Juan

Officially becoming Atabal in 1983, the band is both traditional and modern in its musical expression of bomba and plena. Héctor Rodríguez, better known as “Héctor Atabal”, is one of four musicians that started Atabal. He contributed to creating musical concept and sound of the group . In the 90s he extended the sound by adding brass, cuatro and bass. No longer an active musician because of health reasons he continues to mentor and administrate Atabal. Caymmi Rodríguez (singer, songwriter, percussionist and Héctor's son) has led Atabal on a musical journey that continues offering the rich percussion sounds of the traditional bomba and plena but with a modern pop/urban twist. While updating some of Atabal's classic songs, Caymmi has applied his songwriting abilities and love of these two genres to create original songs that reflect Puerto Rico's everyday life. Most have elements of jazz, Latin percussion, urban, dancehall, flow and pop mixed in with bomba and plena. Atabal has featured singers from Salsa like Andy Montañez, and regueton Vico C. The group has performed throughout the United States, Caribbean and Europe in Festivals: Oostende and Dranouter (Belgium); the Festival del Libro de Guadalajara (Mexico) and Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic), Cuba Disco in Havana (Cuba) and other festivals in the Netherlands, Trinidad and Tobago, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. 9 recordings and many videos can be found online on Spotify, Pandora, ITunes, Soundcloud and YouTube.