Tito Puente Jr. and his orchestra will bring the sound of mambo, salsa, rumba, cha cha cha, and guaguancó to Davie on September 12, performing a full evening titled The Music of Tito Puente at the Rose & Alfred Miniaci Performing Arts Center. The 7:30 p.m. show is part of a full orchestra production featuring percussion, brass, and vocals, built around the catalog of the late Latin music icon Tito Puente.
The concert is one stop on a nationwide tour honoring his father's music, according to WSVN, which reports that Tito Puente Jr. has described the show as a tribute that revives his late father's arrangements. The tour, detailed by Broadway World, combines classic dance arrangements with a full band built to fill dance floors, not just concert seats.
Puente Jr. is the son of Tito Puente, the bandleader known as El Rey del Timbal and El Rey del Mambo, who recorded more than 120 albums and earned five Grammy Awards over his career, along with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, according to WICN. The elder Puente died in May 2000 at age 77, a milestone WSVN notes falls 26 years before this year's Davie performance.
The Songs Behind the Legend
Two of the elder Puente's best-known compositions trace back decades before they became standards. He began writing his signature mambo Ran Kan Kan while serving aboard a U.S. Navy carrier during World War II, later refining it at Juilliard, per ArtSpeak's account carried by Newsweek. His 1963 composition Oye Como Va became a global crossover hit after Santana covered it in 1970, cementing both tracks as staples of Latin music worldwide.
Puente Jr., who lives in South Florida, has spent decades acting as curator of his father's catalog while also building his own career, including the 2004 album In My Father's Shoes. He also performs with The Big 3 Palladium Orchestra alongside Mario Grillo, known as Machito Jr., and Tito Rodriguez Jr., a trio carrying forward the legacy of the 1950s New York Palladium Ballroom mambo era, according to the South Beach Jazz Festival.
An Intimate Stage With University Ties
The Davie show unfolds inside a notably intimate room. The Rose & Alfred Miniaci Performing Arts Center seats just 458 people and sits inside the Alvin Sherman Library on Nova Southeastern University's main campus, operated in a managing partnership with the Broward Center for the Performing Arts. Tickets for the September 12 performance are available through the venue, located at 3051 Ray Ferrero Junior Boulevard in Davie.
Per WSVN's report, Puente Jr. plans to fold an educational aspect into the evening, and his musical director hopes audiences discover the music through the performance. Surprise guest artists are also expected to join the full orchestra onstage, and the show is designed with dancing in mind, with Puente Jr. planning to engage directly with the crowd throughout the set.
A Fit for Broward's Largest Ethnic Group
The Davie date lands in a county where the music's cultural roots run deep. Hispanics make up 32.8% of Broward County's population, the largest single racial or ethnic group in the county as of 2024, according to USAFacts. Davie itself, with a population exceeding 105,000 as of the 2020 U.S. Census, ranks as the largest town by population in Florida and hosts multiple university campuses including Nova Southeastern.
South Florida already functions as something of a home base for Puente Jr. between national tour stops. He has kept an annual June birthday performance series at the Arts Garage in Delray Beach, a recurring regional tradition separate from his cross-country touring schedule. That local routine has previously drawn attention beyond Florida: in October 2024, Puente Jr. headlined the reopening of a renovated theater in San Rafael, California, marking the $866,000 upgrade of that city's 300-seat civic venue.
The Davie performance adds to a busy calendar of live music and public gatherings in the town this year, following events like the Orange Blossom Festival parade and rodeo earlier in 2025 and the municipality's residents-only Fourth of July celebration. For fans of Afro-Cuban rhythms, September 12 offers a chance to hear those classic arrangements performed live in one of Broward's more intimate settings.
-4.webp?w=160&h=400&fit=crop&crop=edges)