Performance · Other credits

Carlos "Patato" Valdes

real name Carlos Valdés Galán

Carlos "Patato" Valdes is credited on 904 releases across 166 albums tracked on Gatefold, active 1955–2025 — the collector-built map of who actually made the music.

Start your shelf →Open in app

904

Credits

166

Albums

8

Decades active

110

In collections

Biography

source

Showing the Discogs bio

Conga player of Cuban origin (born November 4, 1926, Havana, Cuba - died December 5, 2007, New York City), son of tresero and composer.
Considered by some to be the greatest ever Cuban conga player, Patato played with Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Tito Puente, Machito, Mario Bauzá, Quincy Jones and many other salsa and jazz stars.
The first conguero to tune his congas to a song's dominant chord, Patato's influence was felt on the jazz and Latin music scenes and also in the world of film, where he gave Brigitte Bardot a mambo lesson in And God Created Woman.

Bio from Discogs

Credited work

904 releases · 166 albums · active 1955–2025

  • Performance · 1,194
  • Other credits · 88
  • Production · 1

Studios: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey · Newport Jazz Festival · Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, New Jersey · Manhattan Towers

Discography

Records they worked on — most-collected first.

Frequent collaborators

Around the web

See who really made the music.

Gatefold maps every producer, engineer, and player across your shelf — the credits no one else surfaces.

Start your shelf →

Free forever. Works with 10 records or 10,000.