Dear friends at around 8AM Wednesday September 17, 2014 we lost our brother in Bomba Gregorio Allende (aka Macho), band leader for the Bomba group Nostalgia Amarilla. I never met Macho in person but we regularly exchanged messages and talked about our vision and potential projects with each other. I quickly realized that Macho was the type of person that made his visions a reality. He worked hard to complete his film project the film known as "Currency and Exchange" and worked to have it showed at New York City's BomPlenazo music festival and at the Latin Alternative Music Conference also in New York City. Earlier this year Macho completed production on his film and released "Currency and Exchange" in Tampa, Florida. Unfortunately soon after realizing this portion of his dream our friend developed a brain tumor. Though Macho had health insurance as is too often the case he and his family were left with medical bills totaling into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Gregorio's wife Janet has setup a fundraising campaign to address the medical bills left behind by Macho's treatment. If you would like to make a donation go to http://www.gofundme.com/8c77hc
Below is an interview Gregorio gave to the University of South Florida News back in April regarding the release of his film and what the culture of Bomba music meant to him.
Below is the trailer to the film "Currency & Exchange"
My condolences to Janet and to all of Gregorio's family and friends. Macho you will be missed my friend.
Macho was and still will be an inspiration to all of us....It was a pleasure to have had Mr. Allende in our lives...his memory will live forever in our hearts
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