They Blend, Borrow and Sing

When male vocal quartet Son by Four opened for Shakira at the Arrowhead Pond this spring, few in the audience seemed to know who the group was--even though everyone knew the words to its single “A Puro Dolor,” then the theme to a popular telenovela and a growing hit on Latin pop and tropical radio stations.

Now, with more than two months at No. 1 on Billboard’s Latin singles chart with that single, Son by Four has become the biggest story in Latin music so far this year.

Though in Southern California it is regarded mainly as a pop act because of the pop remix of “A Puro Dolor” played on the radio here, Son by Four is actually an innovative tropical fusion ensemble that borrows from R&B;, jazz, timba, flamenco and salsa--similar to the way artists such as Marc Anthony, India, Michael Stuart and DLG also fuse styles.

Furthermore, Son by Four, who’ll be part of the all-star lineup at the Reventon Super Estrella concert Saturday at the Arrowhead Pond, is the first tropical fusion act to cross boundaries in the Latin pop, Mexican regional, romantic Latin and English-language pop radio markets in the U.S.--without releasing an English album first.

As a “guy group” with Orlando, Fla., roots and as a bilingual, bicultural Latin pop act with R&B;, gospel and hip-hop influences, Son by Four has all the ingredients of a musical superpower. It’s the right act, at the right time, and its new label, Sony Discos, has made the most of its assets through intelligently positioning the group in several key markets at once.

Two Spanish versions of “A Puro Dolor,” one tropical and one pop, have penetrated virtually every major Latin radio market in the nation, and a “Spanglish” R&B; version of the song has landed on several key English-language pop stations, catapulting the single to No. 11 on the nation’s mainstream pop chart.

An all-English version of the single is making its way to Top 40 radio as well.

“We’re very pleased with Son by Four’s success,” says Oscar Llord, president of Sony Discos. “I always knew they’d have a mass appeal, and it’s exciting to see it.”

But the members of Son by Four aren’t just thinking about today’s charts. They say they’ve only begun to meet the challenges they set for themselves.

“Son by Four has a lot of hidden talents,” says the group’s lead singer, Angel Lopez, 29. “Hopefully, people will eventually find out about them. It’s great to have all these fans, but it’s important to understand that Son by Four is not just some cheesy pop group.

“We’ll eventually become a legacy of Latin American music. We plan to keep true to our roots, and pray God will give us the strength now to survive all the attention and hardship and travel and lawyers.”

At their recent House of Blues and Arrowhead Pond performances, Son By Four members stepped out of the guy group mold. Their outfits did not match each other. They didn’t dance much. Instead, they seemed focused on the quality of their intricate harmonies, allowing their tropical foundation to outshine their pop tone.

The affection the group’s members have for one another is also apparent, in shared smiles onstage and during an interview backstage at the House of Blues afterward. The three relatives in the group have allowed Lopez into their familial circle, with all the love--and teasing--that entails.

As they drink water thirstily, tiredness shows in their eyes and the young men’s faces are testament to the crazy schedule they’ve been on in recent months, one in which they find themselves on planes every two or three days, performing at least three nights a week all over the nation.

Sudden visibility has given Son by Four the aura of an overnight success, but nothing could be further from the truth.

The group originated in 1992, in Orlando, as a passion for singing in 18-year-old Javier Montes Quiles, now 26.

Javier tried desperately to get his brother Jorge, then 16 and now 24, to start a group with him. Jorge preferred sports but went with his brother to audition for a local tropical band, Noche Caliente, “just to make him happy,” he recalls with a laugh

The teens, who were bilingual thanks to their birth and early childhood in Puerto Rico, were hired and began performing with the group, which opened for major tropical acts that came through Orlando.

But soon the youths packed and moved back to Puerto Rico with their parents, who bought a store in Ciales, the boys’ hometown, population about 20,000.

There, the brothers started a new group with their cousin, Pedro Quiles Otero, now 27, called Blanco y Negro, which they envisioned as fusing elements of Puerto Rican tropical music with U.S. pop sounds.

“We had this idea to do a group that was a vocal harmony group, but in tropical,” says Jorge Quiles. “No one had done that yet.”

Otero, son of an engineer and a retired government worker, studied chemistry and engineering at his parents’ suggestion, but he was pleased to be asked to sing.

“I loved to sing,” he says. “My parents wanted me to have a profession, but to me it was like I tried and tried, but nothing liked me except music.”

They performed at weddings and other functions around Ciales and, in 1997, approached legendary salsa singer Gilberto Santa Rosa, to ask for help in realizing what had become their dream: finding a record deal for their group. He introduced the young men to tropical songwriter and producer Omar Alfanno.

Alfanno thought the group lacked a strong hip-hop and R&B; element. He suggested the young men team with Lopez, a producer, songwriter and singer from the town of Las Piedras, Puerto Rico, who was working with rapper Vico C and other Spanish-language hip-hop artists.

Lopez, 29, was born in Puerto Rico but spent most of his childhood in Chicago, where he grew up in a predominantly African American neighborhood. In Chicago, says Lopez, he learned to sing gospel and soul music, and he developed a love for R&B.;

Lopez and the three guys hit it off, and he was added as the fourth member of the group, named Son by Four by Alfanno’s wife during an evening brainstorm. (“Son” refers to the Afro-Caribbean musical idiom of that name; the “by four,” being an English phrase, represents the influence of four-part harmony R&B; sounds on the group.)

“I started singing professionally at 10,” says Lopez. “I loved gospel music and found it very spiritually and musically fulfilling, and I’ve tried to apply it to tropical music in a new way.”

Alfanno created an independent label, RJO, just to sign Son by Four. The group recorded a 1998 album, “Preparense,” which featured experimental arrangements. It sold well in Puerto Rico but did not get far beyond that. But it got the attention of executives at Sony Discos who invited the group to perform in 1998 at a company convention.

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The group stopped everyone in their tracks, according to Sony Discos’ head, Oscar Llord, and was offered a deal with the company that night; Son by Four still had a contract with RJO, but Sony offered to buy it out.

“Everybody got really crazy,” Jorge Quiles says of the Sony event. “You had to be there. There are no words to describe the feeling. It’s not this thing that happens to anybody, ever, it’s like God wanted us to be there that night.”

All four men in the group mention God often and say, as does Lopez, “he is the fifth element in our group.”

With God and Sony behind it, Son by Four released its eponymous Sony album in February. The album’s momentum built slowly and steadily, and with the help of a cleverly crafted marketing and radio campaign, the group has held firmly to the top of the Latin charts and is now climbing the mainstream charts.

After the House of Blues show, the group was up and running. They had a plane to catch. They’d just flown into Los Angeles that morning, but had to be back in Miami early the next morning for more performances and interviews. The members of the group seemed both happy and miserable at the prospect of more travel; happy because they finally have the recognition they’ve dreamed of, miserable because they’ve lost precious time with wives and children and friends.

The group travels at least three, usually four times a week. For Lopez and Jorge Quiles, this has been particularly tough, because both are married with families they leave behind in Puerto Rico.

Otero says it is also difficult traveling coach class on commercial jets, which they still do, because people always recognize them and ask for autographs and photos during the flight, often the only time the singers have to rest.

“It’s hard, but I’m not complaining,” he says. “We asked for this, and now we’ve got it.”

For now, Son by Four will focus on promoting the current album, in Spanish, Spanglish and English, touring the nation until September. After that, Javier Quiles says, they will focus on the Latin American market with a tour before returning to start on their next album.

Lopez will simultaneously pursue a solo gospel career in Spanish and English, and would love to record a duet with Christian pop superstar Jaci Velasquez.

All members of the group say they hope their crossover success in various markets will ultimately rekindle interest in tropical sounds.

The men all still live in their respective Puerto Rican towns, with no immediate plans to relocate to Miami, which the label has suggested. The label is based in Miami, as are many recording studios and producers, and most Latin pop stars live there.

“We really just want to stay as normal as possible,” says Otero, though he admits it is increasingly hard to do.

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Son by Four appears with Jaguares, Carlos Ponce and others at Reventon Super Estrella, Saturday at the Arrowhead Pond, 2695 E. Katella Ave., Anaheim, 4 p.m. Sold out. (714) 704-2500.