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Spanish Harlem Orchestra Returns with Salsa Navidad and the Sound of Celebration
- Damian Ali
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
The Grammy-winning New York salsa ensemble brings holiday rhythm and tradition to a new generation.
The Spanish Harlem Orchestra Salsa Navidad Photo: Courtesy of Jenny Pulido/SHO
The Spanish Harlem Orchestra (SHO) will release its new album Salsa Navidad on November 17, featuring the lead single “Navidad Con Plena.” The project continues the Grammy-winning band’s long tradition of honoring Latin music through authenticity, rhythm, and heart.
Marking twenty-five years as one of the most respected names in salsa, the orchestra brings a bold and joyous sound rooted in New York and Puerto Rican tradition. Salsa Navidad includes “Navidad Con Plena,” “Jingle Bells,” “Llegó Navidad,” “Cultura y Tradición,” “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” and more.
The ensemble features Oscar Hernández on piano and as bandleader, with vocalists Marco Bermúdez, Carlos Cascante, and Gilberto Velázquez, backed by a full horn and percussion section. The album also features special guests Ray De La Paz, Edwin Colón Zayas, and Kevin Osborne, who help bring the album’s celebratory rhythms to life.
For more than two decades, the Spanish Harlem Orchestra has carried the spirit of New York’s salsa dura sound around the world. Their shows are a living celebration of the barrio, a space where Puerto Rican, Cuban, and jazz influences meet on the dance floor. From Carnegie Hall to the Sydney Opera House, the group has earned critical acclaim for keeping the roots of salsa alive.
“The beauty of it is that we’ve been taking our music all over the world,” said Oscar Hernández, the group’s founder and bandleader, in an interview with Best of Atlanta Concerts (BOAC). “The band has traveled all over the world and has garnered critical acclaim wherever we play, from Carnegie Hall to the Sydney Opera House in Australia to Russia to Israel to all the countries in Europe, not to mention all the great performing arts centers and jazz festivals here.”
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Album cover art for Salsa Navidad, November 17, 2025: Courtesy of Jenny Pulido/SHO
The new album adds a festive twist to that ongoing legacy. Its single “Navidad Con Plena” pays tribute to the rhythms that define Puerto Rican and Latino holiday traditions. “The inspiration was to honor the tradition of Puerto Rican and Latino Christmas utilizing the traditional rhythms of our culture, which are Bomba and Plena,” Hernández told TalkTeaV. “In this case Plena. That is also in the message of the lyrics.”
For Hernández, who grew up in the South Bronx surrounded by the sounds of Tito Puente and Eddie Palmieri, that respect for tradition is more than musical, it is personal. He first sat at a piano at 12 years old, learned by ear, and later studied music at City College before joining Ray Barretto’s legendary band.
Those roots helped shape both his ear and his sense of duty to the genre. “I feel very much obligated and responsible to having that integrity as part of what we do with the Spanish Harlem Orchestra, whether it be a live performance or one of our recordings,” Hernández said in an interview with BOAC. “I can listen back to all the recordings that we did, and a smile comes to my face because I love them all.”
That blend of respect and renewal drives SHO’s sound and Hernández’s approach to every project. “The fact that we are playing music in the native rhythms of our culture while also making arrangement and orchestrations in the style that identifies the SHO sound is how we approached this project,” he explained. “I want fans to feel both things are present, SHO & PR & Christmas Rhythms.”
Hear from the maestro himself
Author’s Note: Allow me to briefly paint an image in your head. If you’ve ever seen Good Times, you may remember the iconic painting “The Sugar Shack” by American artist Ernie Barnes, the joyful dance scene featured in the show’s opening.
Barnes once said it was inspired by a childhood memory of sneaking into a segregated club in North Carolina, watching people lose themselves to the music. That same spirit lives inside the sound of the Spanish Harlem Orchestra. When their horns rise and the percussion hits, living rooms everywhere are transformed into crowded dance floors, each listener adding a brushstroke to a shared cultural memory.
With Salsa Navidad, the Spanish Harlem Orchestra once again bridges time and place, from Puerto Rico to New York, from past to present, reminding listeners that salsa is more than music. It is a living tradition that keeps communities connected, one rhythm at a time.
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