José Luis Colzani - Cadenas
Cadenas were born in Rosario by the hand of guitarist Juan Carlos Tubaro, who had moved there to study Physics. In addition to university, he had also studied music theory, guitar and drums, so his love for music made him approach the local groups of the time, quickly becoming part of bands such as Los Tops, Fisoruga or Guzgu. In 1969 together with two friends called "Mano" and "Bocadito" he formed Cadenas, being one of the first Hard Rock groups in Argentina together with El Reloj. Alberto Arbizu, who played bass in Pappo's Blues, lived in Buenos Aires, but had a family in Rosario, so he struck up a great friendship with Cadenas, offering himself as the group's bassist while Pappo sponsors them, which meant the transfer of Cadenas to Buenos Aires and the participation of the band as a support for Pappo's Blues for almost a year.
Alberto Arbizu
It was a time when all the musicians related to each other playing, so it was easy to find Cadenas alongside musicians of the stature of Norberto Napolitano (Pappo), Luis Alberto Spinetta or Emilio del Guercio. In 1972, Pelo magazine recruited them for the B.A. Rock, sharing the bill with bands like Orion's Beethoven, Días De Blues, Piel De Pueblo, La Pesada, or Vox Dei, among others. Later would come other relevant festivals and performances to which they are also invited: Old Boys, Olimpia Theater, El Padre Mujica or the Astral Theater. Juan Carlos meets Osvaldo Vitale, who played in a famous 60's group called Los Bárbaros.
Osvaldo is relevant in the history of Cadenas, since he will be the one who connects Juan Carlos Tubaro and Alberto Arbizu with two great musicians such as drummer José Luis Colzani and guitarist Marcelo Requena. With the arrival of the latter two, the formation was consolidated with which, after long rehearsals, in 1973 they managed to record a single under the Microfon label, at the ION studios in Buenos Aires, which contains two powerful songs entitled Niño Solitario and Rock para Janis, both recorded in one take with the voice added later.
Already with some popularity they dedicate themselves to touring around Argentina organizing their own concerts, but a disagreement between the producers who worked with the label makes Cadenas never record with Microfon again and leaves them in a void that is more accused of abandonment by Jose Luis Colzani, who despite wanting to continue with the band finds better opportunities in Europe and will go to Belgium for a while. This would be replaced in 1975 by Pablo Helman, great drummer and currently famous director of special effects in Hollywood.
José Luis Colzani
With this line-up and under the name Clímax, they recorded a single at the request of the Parnaso label to work in discotheques, so Cadenas would be left behind and they would stop playing heavy rock. It was from this last album that the producer Cacho Castaña convinced them to create Los Moros, a highly transcendent romantic music band that definitively ended the existence of Cadenas. The press of the time in magazines such as "Pelo" referred to the band with phrases such as:
José Luis Colzani
"There is power and strength in Cadenas, there is an unpublished voice and a quadripartite work of loving rock studying it medullarly since each of them is studying their instrument in a conservatory." With the members of Cadenas there is a paradoxical case: they seem savage playing and yet they know exactly what they are doing" Without a doubt Cadenas was a relevant group in the history of Argentine rock that unfortunately could not transcend further, leaving us only this simple one in which all the the quality and strength that they displayed in their live shows are reflected.
Above text by Eduardo Vila of Yunque Records
I briefly spoke with Colzani about his time in the group, as well as his beginnings in music and how it all came to be. Enjoy!
Marcel Requena: Guitar, Jose Luis Calzani: Drums, Alberto Arbizu: Bass & Vox, Juan Carlos Tubaro: Guitar
Hello, my name José Luis Colzani, I was born in Buenos Aires in 1955. I started studying percussion Symphonic as a listener at age 10 and at the same time studying drums with a teacher, but I did the race at the Manuel de Falla Conservatory in the city of Buenos Aires... Music runs in the family, since my parents were amateur musicians. In those years I liked Rock, bands like Led Zeppelin and all those of the time and also Buddy Rich, American jazz drummer for Big Bands. They were my great references for those teenage years. Also the symphonic music was of great inspiration.
When I was 14 I was playing in the Orchestra Youth Symphony of National Radio directed by Washington Castro. Also at the Conservatory I was member of a percussion band with which we performed in different places, schools etc... And in my house with my sister Analía Colzani (guitarist) and my father on keyboards, We were a trio from the beginning, when we were very young. Join other projects such as a group of ballads with which we record an album. Before Cadenas I played in Los Botas, a band from Rosario. This experience did not last long until Cadenas was formed with Marcelo Requena and Juan Carlos Tubaro as guitarists and the great singer and bassist, Alberto Arbizu.
With Cadenas we recorded a single and played on different stages in Argentina. One of the most memorable was at the Olimpia Theater in the city of Buenos Aires. I was a young teenager and my bandmates were older than me. I was just going to rehearse and play and my father would take me and the drums. I have great memories of recording at ION, a very famous studio in Buenos Aires. But at 18 years old after finishing my percussion studies, I traveled to Europe and I left everything I was doing in my country. So far my story with Cadenas, since I don't know details about what happened after my departure exactly. I was 5 years outside of Argentina in Europe, specifically in Belgium, Switzerland Germany, Italy etc… It's all I can tell you about my time in Cadenas.
