JAZZ

After years of keeping his personal problems with the Castro regime in his native country quiet, famed saxophonist Paquito D’Rivera is going public. According to D’Rivera, Cuban authorities are refusing to let his ex-wife and son join him in New York despite an eight-year effort in which he has paid thousands of dollars for permits. D’Rivera told Reuters that his recent urgency on the subject is because authorities in Havana recently denied his ex-wife and their 13-year-old son, Franco, permission to leave after they presented their final case to officials. D’Rivera, active in the New York Latino and bop jazz scenes, defected from Cuba in 1980 while on a trip to Spain. Spokesmen at the Cuban mission at the United Nations were not immediately available for comment.