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Celia Cruz (1924 - 2003)
"No hay que llorar... que la vida es un carnaval y las penas se van cantando..." - The Queen of Salsa
Celia Cruz is one of Latin music's most respected vocalists. A ten-time Grammy nominee, Cruz, who sings only in her native Spanish language, has received a Smithsonian Lifetime Achievement award, a National Medal Of the Arts and honorary doctorates from Yale University and the University of Miami. A street in Miami has been renamed in her honor.
Celia Cruz has a powerful voice that transfers the rhythmic energy of salsa into the vocal medium, and she has been a prominent figure in the music since the beginnings of her career in Cuba in the 1950s. Leaving Cuba for the United States after the Castro takeover in 1959, Cruz has become a true legend of Latin American music and something of an emblem of Latin American identity.
At the time of the Communist takeover of Cuba in 1959, the group was slated to tour Mexico; from Mexico, rather than returning to Cuba, they entered the United States and remained there. Cruz herself became a U.S. citizen in 1961. Cuban Communist leader Fidel Castro was furious and barred Cruz from returning to Cuba, enforcing the ban even after Cruz's parents' deaths. Cruz for her part has vowed not to return to Cuba until such time as the Castro regime is deposed. In 1962 she married La Sonora Matancera trumpet player Pedro Knight.
Salsa was firmly rooted in Cuban dance traditions, but it was a high-energy new hybrid that incorporated elements of jazz, traditional Afro-Caribbean rhythms, and other forms. It was an ideal medium for the showcasing of Cruz's vocals, for she was both an exciting improviser (she is known for her vocal imitations of instruments in the manner known as "scat" singing in the jazz world), and a singer with the power to stand up to an intense rhythm section. Cruz on stage was a commanding figure whose control over audiences resulted not only from her flamboyant, stage-filling attire, but also from her ability to engage them in call-and-response patterns that spring from salsa's Afro-Cuban roots. The Cuban-born perfomer died of a brain tumour at her home in Fort Lee in 2003, surrounded by family and friends, after undergoing surgery for the condition late last year.
Known as the Queen of Salsa and considered the most influential woman in the history of Afro-Cuban music, she is credited with bringing salsa to a wide audience, notably through her collaboration with Tito Puente, one of the stars of Latin music in the US.
Celia Cruz, an example of the best of the Latin American Spirit.
Quieres saber más de Celia Cruz ? Visita la siguiente liga:
http://celia.lamusica.com/biography.shtml
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The
early facts of Cruz's life are somewhat obscure. Always reluctant to
discuss her age, Cruz--according to some accounts--was born in Havana,
Cuba, on October 21, 1924. Growing up in the city's poor Santo Suárez
neighborhood in a household of 14 children (some were her cousins), she
stood out because of her singing ability. Cruz won a singing contest
called "La hora del té" and with her mother's encouragement began to enter
other contests in various parts of Cuba.
Although
Cruz had made numerous recordings with La Sonora Matancera, she
experienced little success in the United States in the 1960s. Although she
spoke English well she refused to record in the language. Younger Hispanic
Americans at the time were gravitating away from big-band dance music and
toward rock-and-roll, in both Latin and non-Latin inflections. Cruz's
fortunes began to improve when she meshed her talents with those of the
musicians and bandleaders who were creating the new music called
salsa--chief among them Tito Puente, Johnny Pacheco, and Willie Colón.
