As late afternoon turned to dusk on an October day in Madison, Tony Casteñeda settled into his Thursday evening routine.
It involves jamming along on the bongos and congas in the back room of the Cardinal Bar with the five-piece Latin jazz band he leads, the Tony Casteñeda Latin Jazz Band. Thursday is Latin music night at the Cardinal, and keeping rhythm on the drums, Casteñeda’s hands bang away to the Afro-Cuban rhythms while the rest of the band creates an excitingly smooth and exotic sound, bringing the genre of Latin jazz to Madison.
“I just love the music, and I love the vibe,” Casteñeda said.
Casteñeda, 68, is Madison’s godfather of Latin jazz. He came to the city in 1974 to study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and in 1977 became a founding member of Olmeca, Madison’s first Latin jazz band. The group played for over 20 years before Casteñeda formed his own group, which has been playing together since 1998.
Along the way, he’s forged a path greater than music. A social justice advocate, radio and podcast host and bartender among other gigs, the laid-back Casteñeda is a true jack of all trades. Through a variety of avenues, he has become a true and inviting local figure.
Originally from Racine, Wisconsin, Casteñeda got his start in music through his uncle, who played in a Latin orchestra band when he was growing up. When Casteñeda was in fifth grade, his uncle bought him a trumpet, his first instrument. By high school he had a conga drum, teaching himself to beat on to the records of Santana.
A few years later when Casteñeda was at UW-Madison, his band Olmeca played on as a live band in the era of disco. With a weekly gig at State Street Infirmary, Olmeca built the foundation for live Latin jazz in Madison.
“I wanna say he’s kind of a pioneer,” said Anders Svanoe, the saxophonist in Tony’s band and a leader of multiple other musical groups in Madison, referring to Madison’s Latin jazz culture. “He sort of started that whole scene.”
These days, Casteñeda and his band play every Thursday night at the recently reopened Cardinal Bar, with plenty of other gigs scattered in between. This night in the historical bar’s swanky back room, it’s Casteñeda on the bongos and congas, Svanoe belting out melodies and improvisations on the saxophone, Arno Gonzalez providing a Latin percussion flair on the timbales, Dave Stoler bouncing around the keys on the keyboard and Henry Boehm holding the fort down with technique on the double bass. Louka Patenaude also plays with the group, on guitar.
In between songs, Casteñeda casually converses with the evening crowd, appearing like there’s nowhere he’d rather be.
Before he was Madison’s Latin jazz king, Casteñeda found his footing on the political scene. Arriving in Madison in the mid 1970s, the political climate was still plenty hot on campus.
Casteñeda became involved with Mecha, then UW-Madison’s Chicano student organization and fought for a Chicano studies department, which he remembers as a “big struggle.”
“There was a lot of political activity at the time,” Casteñeda said. “I’m still involved, and everyone does their part.”
Olmeca played together until the late 1990s, and Tony started his own band in 1998, with much of the group still together.
The band had a rollicking years-long Sunday night run at the Cardinal, where they would play in front of crowded, cigarette-hazed rooms full of dancers deep into the night. They’ve opened for legendary acts such as Poncho Sanchez and John Santos and have won plenty of local awards.
“We’ve been together for a long time, and I really appreciate the loyalty, the commitment that the guys have to the band,” Casteñeda said.
At the Cardinal bar, his band seamlessly merged Afro-Cuban rhythms with jazz into a free-flowing, deeply enjoyable sound.
Perhaps it’s his laid-back demeanor or his do-anything attitude, but Casteñeda’s decades-long run in Madison has come by no accident. As his invigorating set of Latin jazz came to an energetic end, the Cardinal warmed up. During Latin jazz night, the crowd was fulfilled.
