. >> yeah, the piano player in that recording is sonny white, actually. >> hinojosa: who's also panamanian? >> panamanian. fantastic. >> hinojosa: so you were growing up in panama, pretty humble background. >> mm-hmm. >> hinojosa: poor. >> yes. >> hinojosa: but your parents were very much involved in music, your father. >> yeah. >> hinojosa: so talk about those memories of what you were hearing in panama. what was your life in music as a young boy growing up? >> well, my father was in love with cuban pianists. actually, lino frias, he was in love with a lot of the great artists from panama. but mainly piano players. and he actually introduced me to a fantastic pianist from puerto rico called papo lucca. and my father would sing to me, like, tumbaos, like, (imitates tumbao pattern) when i was a kid, like... (plays tumbao pattern) and we would be all day doing that. >> hinojosa: and that's a tumbao. >> that's a tumbao, that's a tumbao. he would be all day saying, "check out how he changed," if he made a little change like (plays altered tumbao pattern). "look at those notes," from early on.