Alfredo Gutierrez

by Craig Harris
Alfredo Gutierrez is one of the top-ranked performers of Colombian folk music. Together with his band, which includes accordion, drums, guaracharaca, scrapper, bass, guitar, trumpet, Gutierrez combines the Colombian traditions of vallenato, a folk music intially played on the Atlantic coastline for smuggler barons and their gangs, and cumbia, a more-modern, salsa-influenced, style. According to Djambe Online, Gutierrez and his band play a music that is joyful and percussive, with lyrics right out of everyday life, love and money problems.