BY LARRY HARLOW

Thursday eve May 15, 2003 I ventured downtown to Times Square to hear and see Orquesta Aragon De Cuba perform at the "Jazz Corner of the World" Birdland. Andy Kaufman, one of the owners has been an Aragon fan for the last 45 years and truly is a collector of Aragon music and videos. When an opportunity to hire them for his club arrived, he seized the moment and booked them for 3 nights. He is truly an innovator in New York Jazz Circles to have the guts to do that in a jazz venue.I arrived at 10;15 and the first set was still under way with Eddie Palmieri and Eddie Zervigon sitting in on the final song of the first set. My wife Wendy and our friends which included Ray Barretto, Bobby Sanabria, Mappy Torres, my cousin Rhonda Brown from Tampa and a few others were joined by Brian Dennehey and the asst Director of Long Days Journey into the Night for a set of Charanga Heaven. The Orq. Aragon, even being without their leader Rafael Lay Jr. and the Bassist , who were denied visas by the State Dept, were in rare form. A new Timbale player named Horacio Rodriguez was subdued playing without a cymbal(very tipico) but taking a very interesting solo and using a Mambo bell and wood bloch to freshen up some old tunes. David Hersher, former bassist with Orq. Broadway for many years , has been on tour with them for a few weeks and was finally playing and living with his idols.