Mongo Santamaria recorded his composition "Afro Blue" in 1959 when playing with the
Cal Tjader Sextet. The first recorded performance was on April 20, 1959, at the
Sunset Auditorium in Carmel, California, with Santamaría on percussion. "Afro Blue" was the first jazz standard built on a typical African 3:2
cross-rhythm, or
hemiola. The song begins with the bass repeatedly playing six cross-beats per measure of or six cross-beats per four main beats—6:4 (two cells of 3:2). The following example shows the
ostinato "Afro Blue" bass line. The cross noteheads indicate the main
beats (not bass notes). : \new Staff > While the bass sounds the six secondary beats,
Paul Horn's flute solo and
Emil Richards' marimba solo emphasize the four primary beats.
Francisco Aguabella takes the
conga drum solo on the first recording, quoting phrases from the vocabulary of the
abakuá bonkó drum. Using brushes,
Willie Bobo plays an abakuá
bell pattern on a snare drum. This cross-rhythmic figure divides the twelve-pulse cycle into three sets of four pulses. Since the main beats are grouped as four sets of three pulses (dotted quarter-notes in the top example), the bell pattern significantly contradicts the meter. Bobo played this same pattern and instrumentation on the
Herbie Hancock jazz-descarga "Succotash." The harmonic structure of Santamaria's version is a simple B pentatonic blues. ==Vocal version==