Rocca Changa
In This Corner...
The Musical World Of Antonino Rocca
Arranged by Billy Mure
Produced by Guy LeBow for Tempest Enterprises
Recording Supervisor: Danny Davis
Recorded at A&R Studios, New York
Recording Engineer: Phil Ramone
Director Of Engineering: Val Valentin
MGM SE-4183
1963
From the back cover: The world of Antonino Rocco is, to most of us, the world of muscle and sport and courage in championship competition. It's a world of wrestling rings and rugby, physical culture and championship swimming, lecture tours and quiet cultural pursuits.
But Antonino Rocca has a musical world, one he knows and loves deeply. It is this world he has placed on display in this album.
The ruggedly handsome, 38-year-old athlete is one of the greatest authorities on the music and dances of Latin America in this hemisphere. He has drawn heavily on that knowledge, gained through extensive travel and years of personal study, to bring to one album the sounds and the rhythms he admires.
If he's traveled to a country (and he's been to just about every one on the map), then he knows the folk dances of that country. And he'll demonstrate them at the drop of a down beat.
Rocca was a close personal friend of the late Arturo Toscanini, and the great conductor had a profound influence on Antonio's musical education and development. His personal record library is actually larger than the collections of some radio stations! The manager of the record shop at which Rocca does most of his browsing noted recently, "Rocca's been shopping here for 14 years, and we've all come to know that his ear is absolutely incredible. By the amount of enthusiasm he shows when he buys a record or sheet music, we can judge how big a hit that particular tune will be. He hasn't been wrong yet!"
His tremendous popularity in Latin America and among Latin-American people everywhere comes quite naturally. Although Rocca was born in Treviso, Italy, a town near Venice, his family emigrated to Argentina when he was a child. His formative years were spent in Buenos Aires, scene of his earliest sports triumphs and now the site of the world-famous statue of him.
He has become among the greatest sports attractions in history. He was the European champion swimmer, a world-famous wrestler, Latin America's greatest rugby player and an all-around athlete who plays today to full houses the world over.
He is a qualified jet pilot. He has received a doctor of humanities degree from Rosario University in Brazil. He has twice been guest of Edward R. Murrow on "Person To Person" for discussion centering on cultural and artistic subjects. David Brinkley allocated one of his most popular "Brinkley Journal" segments to a full profile of Rocca.
In addition to the sports life, Rocca now is active in the broadcasting field. He has become associated with Guy LeBow, the well-known sportscaster/newscaster, in a daily Spanish-language radio program. Rocca's show, syndicated nationally, has a huge and loyal audience of listeners who hear him hold forth daily on music, art, politics, philosophy and of course sports. He plays music from his own extensive collection. The show, now in its third year, has top ratings in its field since a few months after its start.
LeBow and Danny Davis worked out the concept of the album with Rocca. LeBow's experience in this includes stints as director, producer of radio shows starring Vic Damone, Jerry Vale, Tony Arden and Tony Bennett, among others. With arranger Billy Mure they worked out the program and the instrumentation – eight violins, one woodwind, two trumpets, and an amplified rhythm section.
Rocca was so taken with Mure's 12-year old son, Gary, that he invited the youngsters to sit in among the rhythm players for some of the tunes, Gary, a student drummer, fell right into the swing of things, as a result is part of the Latin percussion section on Esos No Son De Alli, Rocca Changa, and Rocca's Theme.
Antonino also introduces the vivacious singing group, The Malagon Sisters, on this album. The Girls, as attractive visually as they are aurally, give spicy Latin flavor to the musical program of the album.
Tempo and dance style vary from song to song, with a wide variety represented. There are, for example, the tango (La Paloma and El Choclo), bossa nova (La Golondrina and Liebestraum Bossa Nova), a Mure-ish variation on the conga (Rocca Changa). a bacon (Rocca's Theme), a waltz (Cielito Lindo), and more.
Arranger Billy Mure, whose Aztec Guitars launched a new romantic sound in popular music (Maria Elena MGM E/SE-4189), set the tunes in a peppery framework of brass and strings. The familiar songs have new points of view through Mure's fine arrangements.
All together, the arrangements and the sounds and the songs take you easily and melodically into the Musical World Of Antonino Rocca. And although that world is in this corner, it's far from square.
La Paloma
La Golondrina
Cielito Lindo
Clair De Luna
Esos No Son De Alli
Rocco Changa
Clap Hands - Here Comes Rocca (Chiapanecas)
La Violetera
Liebestraum Bossa Nova
Eso Es El Amor
El Choclo
Rocca's Theme
