Lolivone de la Rosa - LYDIALIEBMAN.COM

Jewels
Release Date: June 26, 2026

Guitarist and composer Lolivone de la Rosa announces the release of Jewels, a deeply personal debut shaped by Puerto Rican memory, bebop lineage, and storytelling. Featuring original compositions alongside reimagined standards and folkloric tributes, the album moves between straight-ahead, Afro-Rican, and Afro-Cuban rhythms and introspective songcraft while honoring mentors, collaborators, and family. Each track carries a lived story, from childhood radios and neighborhood heroes to pandemic solitude and humor in adversity, resulting in a record that feels both rooted and exploratory.

The album’s title track, de la Rosa’s first-ever composition, is a dedication to the “gems” in her life: her parents and her brother. Her father, a skilled jeweler who in his youth played the trumpet, bought her a guitar at age 13, and her mother, a singer in Puerto Rico’s first all-woman Bomba band, modeled both discipline and reinvention, later pursuing a career in psychology. “I’m a perfectionist,” de la Rosa says, recalling the post-production process with engineer Dave Darlington. “I thought we’d mix it in one session. It took us five weeks. He was very patient. I would go back and say, ‘Dave, don’t kill me, but let’s lower one DB on that note,’ or the trumpet or guitar is too loud on a particular part. He said, ‘That’s why the album is called Jewels, because we’re polishing them.’”

That meticulous attention to detail is evident throughout the bilingual program, which opens with a swing-to-clave arrangement of Fania All-Star Cheo Feliciano’s 1971 hit “Si Por Mi Llueve,” incorporating a “Perdido” contrafact in the solo form. Feliciano, a neighbor of de la Rosa’s in Trujillo Alto, “embodied the charisma and sense of community that defines what it means to be Puerto Rican.” “This record is like the first baby,” she says. “People want to know, ‘Who is she?’ ‘Where does she come from?’ So I did this arrangement just to give a sense of where I’m coming from. I want to explore points of convergence between where I’m from and where things could move forward, taking what I know and challenging myself to get out of it.”

De la Rosa undertakes that exploration with a plush, centered tone and keen attention to note selection and dynamics, whether joining the flow within her rhythm section, drummer Jeff “Tain” Watts, pianist Luis Perdomo, and bassist John Benítez, or drawing inspiration from them in expansive, thematically cogent improvisations. Featured artists include trumpeter Ingrid Jensen, tenor saxophonists Ned Goold and David Suleiman and percussionists Rogerio Boccato and Joel Mateo, contributing to a program that moves fluidly through bomba, bolero, blues, bebop, and the Great American Songbook with an esprit de corps that reflects both deep musicality and shared joy.

Recorded over the Friday and Saturday following Thanksgiving, the sessions took on the feeling of a family gathering, fueled in part by de la Rosa’s mother’s home cooking. “It was a beautiful session, kind of like a family occasion,” she recalls. “My feedback was that everyone felt taken care of.”

Raised in Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico, de la Rosa began studying piano at age nine before turning to guitar in her early teens, initially focusing on Puerto Rican folkloric music under the instruction of guitarist Elba Lugo. At 16, she began private lessons with Fernando Mattina and attended the Berklee in Puerto Rico program, where she first encountered improvisation in an ensemble setting. Determined to continue her studies, she returned to the program annually while completing a degree in environmental engineering, eventually earning a full scholarship to Berklee College of Music in 2017.

During her time at Berklee, de la Rosa expanded her musical language through transcription and study, including an assignment to learn Kurt Rosenwinkel's solo on Charlie Parker's "Segment," a process that challenged her technical and conceptual approach to the instrument and one she would later honor by recording the tune on Jewels. She also developed a deep appreciation for guitarist Peter Bernstein, whose tone and direct connection to the instrument influenced her own sound, a debt she pays forward on the album with "PB&J," an affectionate dedication to Bernstein.

Following her studies, the onset of the pandemic brought her back to Puerto Rico before she relocated to New York in 2021. There, she quickly embedded herself in the scene, establishing a weekly residency at Casa Mezcal and building relationships with a wide range of collaborators. Regular performances at venues including Smalls and Ornithology, as well as her ongoing work with Ned Goold, further shaped her approach to harmony, improvisation, and ensemble interaction.

Across Jewels, these experiences converge in a program rich with narrative and intention. From the samba-inflected “Ibero,” written during the pandemic in appreciation of Brazilian and Ibero-American musical traditions, to the Monk-inspired “Not In Service” and the affectionate “Ella & Gala,” dedicated to her dogs, each composition reflects a distinct facet of de la Rosa’s musical and personal life. The album also includes a rendition of "Beautiful Friendship," whose theme of love emerging from closeness resonates with de la Rosa's own experience of the relationships that have defined her life and musical journey.

The result is an assured debut that balances tradition and forward motion, precision and spontaneity, individuality and collective spirit. As noted journalist Ted Panken writes in his liner notes, Jewels offers “aural snapshots” that reflect lived experience while pointing toward a future of continued exploration and growth.