Conjunto Cespedes Offers Great Salsa

The perfect salsa show is a very rare animal indeed, but those fortunate enough to catch Conjunto Cespedes’ performance Thursday night at the Conga Room were able to behold this nearly extinct species in all its glory.

Based in the Bay Area, Cespedes is the paradigm of a pan-cultural group, incorporating musicians from places such as Cuba, El Salvador, Chile and the United States in order to recreate the real sound of the Cuban son. Somehow, this ethnic harmony translates into music that is joyous and relentlessly uplifting.

The real star of the band is still Bobi Cespedes, a Cuban powerhouse of a woman who demonstrates on record and in concert that she is the worthy successor to the throne of Celia Cruz.

Although the band’s latest album, the earthy “Flores,” is one of this year’s best, Cespedes also performed plenty of selections from its debut album “Una Sola Casa,” such as the moving “Respeto a la Tierra” and a new version of the Miguel Matamoros classic “Son de la Loma,” which made for a stunning opener.

The group has structured its show with a brilliant premise, alternating the smoking, spicy salsa numbers with brief chants--traditional invocations to Cuban deities performed luxuriously by Bobi’s sweet, chocolaty voice.

When the salsa returns, it does so with a vengeance.