In addition
to being one of Tejano's greatest saxophone players, Joe
Posada is the most skillful composer to fuse jazz and Tejano
in the '90s. Citing John Coltrane, Jeff Lorber and Alfonso
Ramos as influences, his ability to integrate jazz chord
progressions and scatting into the polka beat has brought
Tejano one step closer to the multi-genre fusion claimed,
but not always achieved, by the genre's boosters.
Posada was born in San Antonio in 1954, the same year orchestra
leader Isidro Lopez integrated accordions into his ensemble
in Alice, Texas, an historic event in the birth of what
is now called Tejano music. Raised in the predominantly
Hispanic West Side, he began playing the sax at age 12.
His parents weren't musicians, but his mother forced him
to study music to keep him away from friends she disapproved
of. He worked his way up through talent shows, neighborhood
groups and the like, finally getting stints with well-known
local groups Rudy Tee and the Reno-Bops and Zapata. In 1973,
during what author Ramiro Burr calls Tejano's Golden Age,
he graduated to the Royal Jesters, a premier Onda Chicana
act of the day. He helped out with musical arrangements
in addition to playing sax.
Posada joined ex-Jester David Marez in his band People
in 1977, doing occasional lead vocals, leading rehearsals
and collecting money after gigs. Feeling he had the maturity
to set out on his own, he left the group in 1979. He formed
his own band, Quinto Sol, in 1982, naming it for the fifth
sun in the Aztec calendar. He and Quinto Sol signed with
Cara Records in 1982 and recorded five albums for the
label during the '80s, often cutting brassy rancheras
written by Johnny Perez or Joe Revelez. He punctuated
his songs with sax solos ranging from cool to fiery depending
on the situation, and applied his powerful, if not always
subtle, baritone to romantic lyrics. His music remained
on the progressive side of Tejano, preferring wind instruments
to accordion.
Posada had begun composing in the mid-'70s, but he guarded
his songs, unwilling to give control of publishing to
Cara president Bob Grever. But on January 1, 1990, Capitol/EMI
purchased Cara, and the new executives let him control
his own publishing. Posada didn't record his songs immediately,
relying on tunes by Humberto Ramon and Revelez for his
1991 CD Playin' It with Style, which featured the ranchera
"Valiente" ("Valiant"), a big hit
with a sing-along chorus that foreshadowed Tejano/jazz
fusion efforts to come. He truly came into his own as
a composer on 1993's Breakaway, for which he wrote all
the songs. He went the extra mile for his listeners, recording
a salsa track, a sax instrumental, and the jazz-soul title
track. But it was his 1994 release Canción para
Mi Padre (Song for My Father) that found him integrating
jazz and polka seamlessly, putting him light-years ahead
of the formulaic cookie-cutter bands. The 1996 release
J Posada is a bit misleading — only his son, Gen-Xer
Joe Jr., is pictured on the cover, but the elder Posada
sings lead on eight of the ten tracks.
The late '90s found Joe Sr. pursuing a music degree in
San Antonio and doing an increasing number of jazz gigs
on his own and with Small World and Los Jazz Vatos.
