This Sept. 15 to Oct. 15, NPR Music celebrates artists from all corners of Latinidad with an 'El Tiny' takeover.

Anamaria Sayre | September 25, 2025
The song that opens Chuwi’s Tiny Desk is quick, coy and questioning. In staggered vocals, keys and percussion, the Puerto Rican band gently tells a story about a life well-lived, but something lingers. “Que me faltara,” they all sing. What am I missing? This is a common theme throughout Chuwi’s music — that the members love their family, their island, their home — but, like many Puerto Ricans, they still seek something better: “un guarapo de jengibre y un Puerto Rico libre.”

Chuwi is a collection of family and friends from Isabela, Puerto Rico. (If you caught any of Bad Bunny’s historic residency, Chuwi was the backing band every night for “WELTiTA.”) They come from the western side of the island where bomba, plena and salsa are injected into people’s veins. The band harmoniously incorporates all of these influences into its sound, trading ocean blues and sunset pinks for playful jazz breaks and tasteful synthesizer effects. Chuwi’s members build a landscape of their home wherever they go, making it feel as though the something missing is and always will be irrefutably theirs.

SET LIST
“Falta Algo”
“Tikiri”
“Tierra”
“Guerra”
“Chuwi Navidades en Cataño”

MUSICIANS
Lorén Aldarondo: vocals
Wilfredo “Willy” Aldarondo: vocals, bass, tres cubano, percussion
Wester Aldarondo: keys, piano, percussion, background vocals
Adrián López: percussion, background vocals
Jan Angelo Marrero Báez: French horn, background vocals
Jorge Gabriel López: percussion, background vocals
Abneris Jasmin: background vocals
Carolina A. López Soto: background vocals, electronics

TINY DESK TEAM
Producer: Anamaria Sayre
Director/Editor: Kara Frame
Audio Technical Director: Josh Newell
Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
Videographers: Kara Frame, Maia Stern, Joshua Bryant
Audio Engineer: Josephine Nyounai
Production Assistant: Dhanika Pineda
Photographer: Grace Raver
Series Editor: Lars Gotrich
Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson

#tinydesk #nprmusic #chuwi

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