Monsieur Periné creates its own Latin-tinged cocktail of world music

The alternative-Latin group Monsieur Periné defies labels and categories, and its members are perfectly content with that.

“Our sound is Latin roots,” said Catalina García, the band’s lead singer, who along with guitarist Santiago Prieto forms the core of Monsieur Periné, which performs July 31 at Ravinia as part of its Breaking Barriers festival. “We love to embrace happiness and romanticism and also diversity. We blend cultures. Categories work for industries, but not music. To reduce whatever Latin means to a label, that’s wrong. We don’t like our music to be put in a category, because all the time, it’s mixing and evolving.” 

Prieto feels the same way. “We are musicians. We love every type of music. Also rock en español, for example,” said Prieto in a recent interview with WPLG-TV, the ABC affiliate in Miami. “Everything, I think, exerts an influence.”

Founded 15 years ago in Colombia, Monsieur Periné represents the growing faction of bands that don’t fit into usual Latin-music industry categories of tropical Latin or regional Mexican. With its elements of cabaret, jazz and swing, the band cultivates a truly trans-continental sound, built on a base of Afro-Colombian rhythms — provided by Darwin Páez on drums, Miguel Guerra on percussion, Abstin Caviedes and Jairo A. Barrera on horns and Eva Peroni on bass.

Born in Cali, Colombia, García grew up with all types of music. “I was obsessed with salsa. I would listen from 6 a.m. until I went to bed at night,” she said. “When I was a child, we had the Latin rock boom, so we had [Latin rock artists] Fito Paez, Charly Garcia, Café Tacuba — all bands that brought American and English rock together with Latin roots. Then I got into swing, gypsy jazz. In that way, I started listening to jazz when I wasn’t into it before.” 

“We don’t like our music to be put in a category, because all the time, it’s mixing and evolving.” — Catalina García of Monsieur Periné

Speaking of jazz, García is a huge fan of American bassist esperanza spalding, who shares the same bill with Monsieur Periné at Ravinia. “I love her. I discovered her music about 10 years ago. She’s amazing,” García said. “I’m honored to be on the same stage with her.”

Monsieur Periné has released three albums so far, with a fourth in the works. The third disc, “Encanto Tropical” (2018), which had a strong Brazilian vibe, built on momentum from the group’s best new artist Latin Grammy win in 2015. 

“For us, Brazil [though Portuguese-speaking] is part of Latin America, the cultures are very close,” García said. “It has the biggest Afro community in Latin America. The rhythm and richness of harmony of Latin music also comes from our African roots. So it’s natural to have this accent in our music.” 

Over the last year, Monsieur Periné has released three new singles “Volverte a Ver,” “Tu y Yo” featuring Spanish vocalist Vanesa Martín and “Nada.” They will be featured on the group’s next disc, due out later this year on Sony. “We've been working on this record for almost three years,” she said. “We wanted to release it earlier but then the pandemic came. It gave us more time to experiment with sounds and write more songs. It’s a powerful record reflecting the challenge we are living in this crazy time.”

Rafa Sardina will produce the disc, along with García and Prieto. “We’re not going to say a lot about it now, but there have been a lot of clues to imagine what it could be through our latest singles,” García said.

Whatever the result, the latest disc will reflect the melting pot of Latin America — and by extension, the whole music universe. “We don’t make about music just to talk about Colombia,” she said. “We take on the entire world.”