Arsenio Rodríguez (born Ignacio Arsenio Travieso Scull; August 31, 1911 – December 30, 1970)Giro, Radamés 2007. ''Diccionario enciclopédico de la música en Cuba''. La Habana, v. 4, p. 45 et seq. was a

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

n musician, composer and bandleader. He played the tres, as well as the tumbadora, and he specialized in son, rumba and other Afro-Cuban music styles. In the 1940s and 1950s Rodríguez established the ''

conjunto The term ''conjunto'' (, literally 'group', 'ensemble') refers to several types of small musical ensembles present in different Latin American musical traditions, mainly in Mexico and Cuba. While Mexican conjuntos play styles such as '' norteño' ...

'' format and contributed to the development of the

son montuno Son montuno is a subgenre of son cubano developed by Arsenio Rodríguez in the 1940s. Although ''son montuno'' ("mountain sound") had previously referred to the ''sones'' played in the mountains of eastern Cuba, Arsenio repurposed the term to de ...

, the basic template of modern-day salsa. He claimed to be the true creator of the

mambo Mambo most often refers to: *Mambo (music), a Cuban musical form *Mambo (dance), a dance corresponding to mambo music Mambo may also refer to: Music * Mambo section, a section in arrangements of some types of Afro-Caribbean music, particul ...

and was an important as well as a prolific composer who wrote nearly two hundred songs. Despite being blind since the age of seven, Rodríguez quickly managed to become one of Cuba's foremost ''treseros''. His first hit, " Bruca maniguá" by Orquesta Casino de la Playa, came as a songwriter in 1937. For the following two years Rodríguez worked as composer and guest guitarist for the Casino de la Playa. In 1940 he formed his ''conjunto'', one of the first of its kind. After recording over a hundred songs for

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Group Corporation. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside Columbia Records (its former longtime rival), Arista Records and Epic ...

over the course of twelve years, Rodríguez moved to New York in 1952, where he remained active, releasing several albums. In 1970, Rodríguez moved to Los Angeles, where he died of

pneumonia Pneumonia is an Inflammation, inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of Cough#Classification, productive or dry cough, ches ...

Life and career

Early life

Ignacio Arsenio Travieso Scull was born on August 31, 1911, in Güira de Macurijes in Bolondrón ( Pedro Betancourt),

Matanzas Province Matanzas () is one of the provinces of Cuba. Major towns in the province include Cárdenas, Colón, Jovellanos and the capital of the same name, Matanzas. The resort town of Varadero is also located in this province. Among Cuban provinces, ...

. He was the third of fifteen children, fourteen boys and one girl, to Bonifacio Travieso, a farmer and veteran of the

Cuban War of Independence The Cuban War of Independence (), also known in Cuba as the Necessary War (), fought from 1895 to 1898, was the last of three liberation wars that Cuba fought against Spain, the other two being the Ten Years' War (1868–1878) and the Litt ...

, and Dorotea Rodríguez Scull.García, David F. (2006)
''Arsenio Rodríguez and the transnational flows of Latin popular music''
Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, p. 13. His family had Kongo origins, and both his grandfather and great-grandfather were practitioners of Palo Monte.García 2006, p. 14. By the time Arsenio was four, in 1915, his family moved to the town of Güines, where his three younger siblings (Estela, Israel "Kike" and Raúl) were born. In 1918, at around seven years of age, Arsenio was blinded when a horse kicked him in the head after he accidentally hit the animal with a broom. This tragic event prompted Arsenio to become very close with his brother Kike, and to become interested in writing and performing songs. The young brothers began playing the '' tumbadora'' at rumba performances in Matanzas and Güines, and became also immersed in the traditions of Palo Monte and its secular counterpart, yuka.García 2006, p. 15. Furthermore, their neighbour in the neighbourhood of Leguina, Güines, was a

Santería Santería (), also known as Regla de Ocha, Regla Lucumí, or Lucumí, is an African diaspora religions, Afro-Caribbean religion that developed in Cuba during the late 19th century. It arose amid a process of syncretism between the traditional ...

practitioner who hosted celebrations for Changó, exposing Arsenio and Kike to West African drumming and chanting. In rural parties such as ''guateques'', they also learned the son, a genre of music that originated in the eastern region of the island. Arsenio learned how to play the marímbula and the botija, two rudimentary instruments used in the rhythm section, and more importantly he took up the tres, a small guitar, now considered Cuba's national instrument. He received classes from Víctor González, a renowned ''tresero'' from Güines. Following the destruction of their home by a Category 4 hurricane in 1926, Arsenio and his family moved from Güines to

Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.Marianao (his older brother Julio had already been living and working there).García 2006, p. 16. By 1928 he had formed the Septeto Boston which often performed in third-tier, working-class cabarets in the area. His father died in 1933 and sometime in the early 1930s, Arsenio changed his

stage name A stage name or professional name is a pseudonym used by performers, authors, and entertainers—such as actors, comedians, singers, and musicians. The equivalent concept among writers is called a ''nom de plume'' (pen name). Some performers ...

from Travieso (which means "mischievous" or "naughty") to his mother's maiden name, Rodríguez, a fairly common Spanish surname. After dissolving the unsuccessful Septeto Boston in 1934, Rodríguez joined the Septeto Bellamar, directed by his uncle-in-law José Interián and featuring his cousin Elizardo Scull on vocals. The group often played at dance academies such as Sport Antillano.

Rise to fame

By 1938, Rodríguez was the ''de facto'' musical director of the Septeto Bellamar and his name had become familiar to important figures such as Antonio Arcaño and Miguelito Valdés. His acquaintance with the latter made it possible for one of his songs, " Bruca maniguá", to be recorded by the famous Orquesta Casino de la Playa in June 1937. The song, featuring Valdés on vocals, became an international hit and Rodríguez's breakthrough composition. The band also recorded Rodríguez's "Ben acá Tomá" in the same recording session, becoming their next A-side. In 1938 they recorded "Yo son macuá", "Funfuñando" (also a hit) and "Se va el caramelero", which included Rodríguez's first recorded performance, a remarkable solo on the tres. In 1940, on the wave of his success with Casino de la Playa, Rodríguez formed his own ''conjunto'', which featured three singers (playing claves,

maracas A maraca ( , , ), sometimes called shaker or chac-chac, is a rattle which appears in many genres of Caribbean and Latin music. It is shaken by a handle and usually played as part of a pair. Maracas, also known as tamaracas, were rattles of d ...

and

guitar The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

), two

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz musical ensemble, ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest Register (music), register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitche ...

s, tres,

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Wood * Bass or basswood, the wood of the tilia americana tree Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in th ...

, tumbadora and bongo. At the time, only two other ''conjuntos'' existed: Conjunto Casino and Alberto Ruiz's Conjunto Kubavana. This type of ensemble would replace the former ''septetos'', although some such as the Septeto Nacional would perform on and off for years. Of all the conjuntos, Arsenio Rodríguez's became the most successful and critically acclaimed one during the 1940s. His popularity earned him the nickname ''El Ciego Maravilloso'' (The Blind Marvel). The first single by his conjunto was "El pirulero no vuelve más", a pregón which tried to capitalize on the success of "Se va el caramelero". In 1947, Rodríguez went to New York for the first time. There, he hoped to get cured of his blindness but eye specialist Ramón Castroviejo was told that his optic nerves had been completely destroyed. This experience led him to compose the bolero "La vida es un sueño" (Life is a dream). He returned to New York in 1948 and 1950 before establishing himself in the city in 1952. He played with influential artists such as Chano Pozo,

Machito Frank Grillo (born Francisco Raúl Gutiérrez Grillo; December 3, 1909 – April 15, 1984) known professionally as Machito (previously as Macho), was a Latin jazz musician who helped refine Afro-Cuban jazz and create both Cubop and salsa music ...

Dizzy Gillespie John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie ( ; October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, composer, educator and singer. He was a trumpet virtuoso and improvisation, improviser, building on the virtuosic style of Roy El ...

and Mario Bauzá. On March 18, 1952, Rodríguez made his final recordings with his band for RCA Victor in Cuba.García 2006, p. 68. He finally left Havana on March 22, 1952, having handed the direction of the conjunto to trumpeter Félix Chappottín. Chappottín and the other remaining members, including pianist

Lilí Martínez Luis Martínez Griñán (19 August 1915 – 26 August 1990), better known as Lilí Martínez, was a Cuban pianist, arranger and composer specializing in the son montuno style. He played in the Conjunto de Arsenio Rodríguez and Conjunto Chappo ...

and singer Miguelito Cuní, formed Conjunto Chappottín. He would return to Havana for the last time in 1956.

Later life and death

During the 1960s, the mambo craze petered out, and Rodríguez continued to play in his typical style, although he did record some

boogaloo Boogaloo or bugalú (also: shing-a-ling, Latin boogaloo, Latin R&B) is a music genre, genre of Latin music and dance which was popular in the United States in the 1960s. Boogaloo originated in New York City mainly by stateside Puerto Ricans with ...

numbers, without much success. As times changed, the popularity of his group declined. He tried a new start in

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

. He invited his friend Alfonso Joseph to fly out to Los Angeles with him but died there only a week later, on December 30, 1970, from

. His body was returned for burial to New York. There is much speculation about his financial status during his last years, but Mario Bauzá denied that he died in poverty, arguing that Rodríguez had a modest income from royalties.

Innovations

Rodríguez's chief innovation, his interpretation of the

, established the basic template for Cuban popular dance music and salsa that continues to this day. "It took fifty years for Latin music to catch up with what Arsenio was doing in the 1940s"—Kevin Moore (2007: web).

Clave-based structure and offbeat emphasis

The decades of the 1920s and 1930s were a period which produced some of the most beautiful and memorable melodies of the son genre. At the same time, the rhythmic component had become increasingly deemphasized, or in the opinion of some, "watered-down". Rodríguez brought a strong rhythmic emphasis back into the son. His compositions are clearly based on the key pattern known in Cuba as '' clave'', a Spanish word for 'key', or 'code'. When clave is written in two measures, as shown above, the measure with three strokes is referred to as the ''three-side,'' and the measure with two strokes—the ''two-side.'' When the chord progression begins on the three-side, the song, or phrase is said to be in 3-2 clave. When it begins on the two-side, it's in 2-3 clave. The 2-3 bass line of "Dame un cachito pa' huele" (1946) coincides with the three-side of the clave's five-note pattern. David García identifies the accents of "and-of-two" (in cut-time) on the three-side, and the "and-of-four" (in cut-time) on the two-side of the clave, as crucial contributions of Rodríguez's music.García 2006, p. 43. The two offbeats are present in the following 2-3 bass line from Rodríguez's "Mi chinita me botó" (1944). Moore points out that Rodríguez's conjunto introduced the two-celled bass tumbaos, that moved beyond the simpler, single-cell tresillo structure. This type of bass line has a specific alignment to clave, and contributes melodically to the composition. Rodríguez's brother Raúl Travieso recounted, Rodríguez insisted that his bass players make the bass "sing." Moore states: "This idea of a bass tumbao with a melodic identity unique to a specific arrangement was critical not only to timba, but also to

Motown Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...

, rock,

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the ...

, and other important genres." In other words, Rodríguez is a creator of the bass

riff A riff is a short, repeated motif or figure in the melody or accompaniment of a musical composition. Riffs are most often found in rock music, punk, heavy metal music, Latin, funk, and jazz, although classical music is also sometimes based ...

. Breaks ('cierres') Rodríguez's "Juventud amaliana" (1946) contains an example of one of his rhythmically dynamic unison breaks, strongly rooted in clave. Moore is referring to the second and third measures of the break in the previous example. Here is that figure in relation to 2-3 clave. When the pattern is used as a type of block chord guajeo, as in " Oye Como Va", it's referred to as ''ponchando''.

Layered guajeos

Rodríguez introduced the idea of layered

guajeo A guajeo (Anglicized pronunciation: ''wa-hey-yo'') is a typical Cuban ostinato melody, most often consisting of arpeggiated chords in syncopated patterns. Some musicians only use the term ''guajeo'' for ostinato patterns played specifically by ...

s (typical Cuban

ostinato In music, an ostinato (; derived from the Italian word for ''stubborn'', compare English ''obstinate'') is a motif or phrase that persistently repeats in the same musical voice, frequently in the same pitch. Well-known ostinato-based pieces inc ...

melodies)—an interlocking structure consisting of multiple

contrapuntal In music theory, counterpoint is the relationship of two or more simultaneous Part (music), musical lines (also called voices) that are harmonically dependent on each other, yet independent in rhythm and Pitch contour, melodic contour. The term ...

parts. This aspect of the son's modernization can be thought of as a matter of "re-Africanizing" the music. Helio Orovio recalls: "Arsenio once said his trumpets played figurations the 'Oriente' tres-guitarists played during the improvisational part of el son" (1992: 11). Oriente is the easternmost province of Cuba, where the son was born. It is common practice for treseros to play a series of

variations during their solos. Perhaps it was only natural then that it was Rodríguez, the tres master, who conceived of the idea of layering these variations on top of each other. The following example is from the "diablo" section of Rodríguez's "Kila, Quique y Chocolate" (1950). The excerpt consists of four interlocking guajeos: piano (bottom line), tres (second line), 2nd and 3rd trumpets (third line), and 1st trumpet (fourth line). 2-3 Clave is shown for reference (top line). Notice that the piano plays a single celled (single measure) guajeo, while the other guajeos are two-celled. It's common practice to combine single and double-celled ostinatos in Afro-Cuban music.

Expansion of the son conjunto

The denser rhythmic weave of Rodríguez's music required the addition of more instruments. Rodríguez added a second, and then, third trumpet—the birth of the Latin horn section. He made the bold move of adding the

conga The conga, also known as tumbadora, is a tall, narrow, single-headed drum from Cuba. Congas are staved like barrels and classified into three types: quinto (lead drum, highest), tres dos or tres golpes (middle), and tumba or salidor (lowest ...

drum, the quintessential

Afro-Cuban Afro-Cubans () or Black Cubans are Cubans of full or partial sub-Saharan African ancestry. The term ''Afro-Cuban'' can also refer to historical or cultural elements in Cuba associated with this community, and the combining of native African a ...

instrument. Today, we are so used to seeing conga drums in Latin bands, and that practice began with Rodríguez. His bongo player used a large, hand-held cencerro ('cowbell') during

montuno Montuno has several meanings pertaining to Cuban music and its derivatives. Literally, ''montuno'' means 'comes from the mountain', and so '' son montuno'' may refer to the older type of son played in the mountainous rural areas of Oriente. Ano ...

s (call-and-response chorus sections). Rodríguez also added a variety of rhythms and harmonic concepts to enrich the son, the

bolero Bolero is a genre of song which originated in eastern Cuba in the late 19th century as part of the trova tradition. Unrelated to the older Spanish dance of the same name, bolero is characterized by sophisticated lyrics dealing with love. It h ...

, the

guaracha The guaracha () is a genre of music that originated in Cuba, of rapid tempo and comic or picaresque lyrics. The word has been used in this sense at least since the late 18th and early 19th century. Guarachas were played and sung in musical the ...

and some fusions, such as the bolero-son. Similar changes had been made somewhat earlier by the Lecuona Cuban Boys, who (because they were mainly a touring band) had less influence in Cuba. The overall 'feel' of the Rodríguez conjunto was more African than other Cuban conjuntos.

Piano guajeos

Rodríguez took the pivotal step of replacing the guitar with the piano, which greatly expanded the contrapuntal and harmonic possibilities of Cuban popular music. The piano

for "Dame un cachito pa' huele" (1946) completely departs from both the generic son guajeo and the song's melody. The pattern marks the clave by accenting the backbeat on the two-side. Moore observes: "Like so many aspects of Arsenio's music, this miniature composition is decades ahead of its time. It would be forty years before groups began to consistently apply this much creative variation at the guajeo level of the arranging process" (2009: 41). The piano guajeo for "Jumba" (a.k.a. "Zumba") (1951) is firmly aligned with clave, but also has a very strong nengón flavor — something which had rarely, or never, been used in Havana popular music. While Rodríguez was not from Oriente province (where nengón and changüí are played), he had a thorough knowledge of many folkloric styles and his creative partner, the pianist/composer Luis "Lilí" Martínez Griñán, in fact came from that part of the island.

Diablo, the proto-mambo?

Leonardo Acosta is not convinced by Rodríguez's claim to have invented the mambo, if by ''mambo'' Rodríguez meant the big-band arrangements of Dámaso Pérez Prado. Rodríguez was not an arranger: his lyrics and musical ideas were worked over by the group's arranger. The compositions were published with just the minimal bass and treble piano lines. To achieve the big-band mambo such as by Pérez Prado,

Tito Puente Ernest Anthony Puente Jr. (April 20, 1923 – May 31, 2000), commonly known as Tito Puente, was an American musician, songwriter, bandleader, timbalero, and record producer. He composed dance-oriented mambo and Latin jazz music. He was also k ...

Tito Rodríguez Pablo Rodríguez Lozada (January 4, 1923 – February 28, 1973), better known as Tito Rodríguez, was a Puerto Rican singer and bandleader. He started his career singing under the tutelage of his brother, Johnny Rodríguez. In the 1940s, both m ...

requires a full orchestration where the trumpets play counterpoint to the rhythm of the saxophones. This, a fusion of Cuban with big-band jazz ideas, is not found in Rodríguez, whose musical forms are set in the traditional categories of Cuban music. While it is true that the mambo of the 1940s, and 1950s contains elements not present in Rodríguez's music, there is considerable evidence that the contrapuntal structure of the mambo began in the conjunto of Arsenio Rodríguez.Salazar, Max 1992. "Who Invented the Mambo?" part 1. ''Latin Beat Magazine''. v. 2 n. 9: 9. p. 10. While working in the charanga Arcaño y Sus Maravillas, Orestes López "Macho" and his brother Israel López "Cachao" composed "Mambo" (1938), the first piece to use the term. A prevalent theory is that the López brothers were influenced by Rodríguez's use of layered guajeos (called ''diablo''), and introduced the concept into the charanga's string section with their historical composition. As Ned Sublette observes: "Arsenio maintained till the end of his life that the mambo — the big band style that exploded in 1949 — came out of his diablo, the repeating figures that the trumpets in the band played. Arsenio claimed to have already been doing that in the late 1930s" (2004: 508). As Rodríguez himself asserts: "In 1934, I was experimenting with a new sound which I fully developed in 1938." Max Salazar concurs: "It was Arsenio Rodríguez's band that used for the first time the rhythms which today are typical for every mambo" (1992: 10). In an early article on mambo, published in 1948, the writer Manuel Cuéllar Vizcaíno suggests that Rodríguez and Arcaño's styles emerged concurrently, which might account for the decades-long argument concerning the identity of the "true" inventor of the mambo. In the late 1940s Pérez Prado codified the contrapuntal structure of the mambo within a horn-based big band format.

Style

Rodríguez's style was characterized by a strong Afro-Cuban basis, his son compositions being much more ''africanized'' than those by his contemporaries. This emphasis is observed in the high number of rumba and afro numbers in his catalogue, most notably his first famous composition, " Bruca maniguá". This is also exemplified by the inclusion of musical and linguistic elements from

Abakuá Abakuá, also sometimes known as Ñañiguismo, is a Cuban initiatory religious fraternity founded in 1836. The society is open only to men and those initiated take oaths to not reveal the secret teachings and practices of the order. Members are ...

, Lucumí (

), and Palo Monte traditions into his music. On '' Palo Congo'' by Sabú Martínez (1957) Rodríguez sings and plays a traditional palo song and rhythm, a Lucumí song for Eleggua, and a rumba and a conga de comparsa accompanied by tres. Rodríguez's 1963 landmark album ''Quindembo'' features an abakuá tune, a , and several band adaptations of traditional palo songs, accompanied by the bona fide rhythms. Rodríguez was an authentic rumbero; he both played the tumbadora and composed songs within the rumba genre, especially guaguancós. Rodríguez recorded folkloric rumbas and also fused rumba with son montuno. His "Timbilla" (1945) and "Anabacoa" (1950) are examples of the guaguancó rhythm used by a son conjunto. On "Timbilla", the bongós fulfill the role of the quinto (lead drum). In "Yambú en serenata" (1964) a yambú using a quinto is augmented by a tres, bass, and horns. In 1956, Rodríguez released the folkloric rumbas "Con flores del matadero" and "Adiós Roncona" in Havana. The tracks consist of voice and percussion only. One of the last recordings Rodríguez performed on was the rumba album ''Patato y Totico'' by the conguero Carlos "Patato" Valdés and vocalist Eugenio "Totico" Arango (1967). The tracks are purely folkloric, except for the unconventional addition of Rodríguez on tres and Israel López " Cachao" on bass. Additional personnel included Papaíto and Virgilio Martí. Also released in the 1960s, the album ''Primitivo'', featuring Monguito el Único and Baby González alternating on lead vocals, is an evocation of the music played in the ''solares''.

Tributes

There have been numerous tributes to Arsenio Rodríguez, especially in the form of LPs. In 1972, Larry Harlow recorded ''Tribute to Arsenio Rodríguez'' (Fania 404) with his band Orchestra Harlow. On this LP, five of the numbers had been recorded earlier by Rodríguez' conjunto. In 1994, the Cuban revivalist band Sierra Maestra recorded ''Dundunbanza!'' (World Circuit WCD 041), an album containing four Rodríguez numbers, including the title track. Arsenio Rodríguez is mentioned in a national television production called ''La época'', about the Palladium era in New York, and Afro-Cuban music. The film discusses Arsenio's contributions, and features some of the musicians he recorded with. Others interviewed in the movie include the daughter of legendary Cuban percussionist Mongo Santamaría – Ileana Santamaría, bongocero Luis Mangual and others. Rodríguez's close friend and bassist for eight years Alfonso "El Panameño" Joseph, as well as other members of Rodríguez's band, such as Julián Lianos, who performed with Rodríguez at the Palladium Ballroom in New York during the 1960s, have had their legacies documented in a national television production called ''La Época'', released in theaters in the US in September 2008, and in Latin America in 2009. He had much success in the US and migrated there in 1952, one of the reasons being the better pay of musicians. Starting in the late 1990s, jazz guitarist

Marc Ribot Marc Ribot (; born May 21, 1954) is an American guitarist and composer. His work has touched on many styles, including no wave, free jazz, Rock music, rock, and Cuban music. Ribot is also known for collaborating with other musicians, most notab ...

recorded two albums mostly of Rodríguez' compositions or songs in his repertoire:'' Marc Ribot y los Cubanos Postizos'' (or ''Marc Ribot and the Prosthetic/Fake Cubans'') and '' Muy Divertido!''. In 1999, Rodríguez was posthumously inducted into the

International Latin Music Hall of Fame The International Latin Music Hall of Fame (ILMHF) was an annual event established in 1999 and held in New York City to honor artists who have largely contributed to the Latin music genre. In addition to the induction into the Hall of Fame, the a ...

. Belatedly, the borough of the Bronx officially had the intersection of Intervale Ave. and Dawson St. in the area known as Longwood renamed "Arsenio Rodríguez Way" in a dedication and unveiling ceremony on Thursday, June 6, 2013. "That intersection was the center of his universe," said José Rafael Méndez, a community historian. "He lived in that area. And all the clubs he played, like the Hunts Point Palace, were practically a stone's throw away." The street designation serves as the crowning jewel after an arduous series of collaborative efforts and events produced last year that rendered tribute to the band leader and resident performer of the Longwood community.

Notable compositions

The following songs composed by Arsenio Rodríguez are considered Cuban

standards Standard may refer to: Symbols * Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs * Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification Norms, conventions or requirements * Standard (metrology), an object t ...

: * " Bruca maniguá" * "El reloj de Pastora" * "Monte adentro" * "Dundunbanza" * "Como traigo la yuca" (also known as "La yuca de Catalina" or "Dile a Catalina") * "Fuego en el 23" * "Meta y guaguancó" * "Kila, Kike y Chocolate" * "Los sitios acere" * "La fonda de el bienvenido" * "Mami me gustó" * "Papa Upa" * "El divorcio" * "Anabacoa" * "Adiós Roncona" * "Dame un cachito pa' huelé" * "Yo no como corazón de chivo" * "Juégame limpio"

Discography

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rodriguez, Arsenio 1911 births 1970 deaths 20th-century Cuban guitarists 20th-century Cuban male musicians Bang Records artists Blind musicians Burials at Ferncliff Cemetery Cuban bandleaders Cuban emigrants to the United States Cuban guitarists Cuban male guitarists Cuban people of Kongo descent Cuban songwriters Deaths from pneumonia in California Cuban male songwriters Musicians from Havana Son cubano musicians Tres players