RICHIE ZELLON'S HYBRID HITS.

• Author: Holston, Mark
• Position: Review

If there is one contemporary musician who truly personifies the successful synthesis of the myriad pan-American genres into unconventional and compelling new forms, it is undoubtedly Lima, Peru-born guitarist, composer, and all-around music alchemist Richie Zellon. From the seldom-heard rhythms of his homeland to more familiar Afro-Caribbean and Brazilian idioms, and disparate influences from the worlds of classical and popular music, Zellon employs vision and wit to achieve stylistic hybrids previously uncontemplated.

Growing up in Lima in the sixties and seventies, at a time when reruns of U.S. television programs and imported rock music had begun to supplant long-held local cultural values, it's not surprising that among the budding musician's first influences was guitar icon Jimi Hendrix, a seminal figure in experimental rock of the day. A self-taught guitarist who quickly developed the skills needed to launch his career as a professional musician, Zellon initially worked as a recording artist, dutifully adapting to the requirements of each session.

"The styles I was surrounded with and worked with were salsa and cumbia from Colombia," he recalls. Then, his music universe began to expand. "When I first heard the music of Astor Piazolla [the late Argentine tango composer], I immediately fell in love with it. And, at the same time, I was becoming more acquainted with what was right at our doorstep--the different styles of Peruvian music, including what really caught my ear, a number of Afro-Peruvian rhythms."

His mother, a native of Brazil, also contributed to his evolution as a musician. Because his father, a U.S. citizen, worked for an airline, they were able to spend his school vacation months in Rio de Janeiro, where he experienced firsthand the music his mother loved, the bossa novas and pop ballads of such artists as Antonio Carlos Jobim, Edu Lobo, and Elis Regina.

After recording what was the first album of Afro-Peruvian-flavored Latin jazz, Zellon traveled to the U.S. to further his formal music studies at San Francisco's Music and Arts Institute and at Boston's famed Berklee College, a finishing school for aspiring jazz musicians. Along the way, encounters with such influential figures as Latin rock pioneer Carlos Santana and jazz guitarist Pat Martino helped the young Peruvian shape his style as a soloist.

From his first album as a leader, the 1994 release Card con leche, Zellon has emerged as a champion of such little-heard...