El veintiuno de octubre/October 21st
¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Celia Cruz (1925-2003)!
"Because of [Celia Cruz], we have unapologetic Black women in music, Afro-Cuban rhythms and glamour, [and] Latinx presence in entertainment." -Smithsonian Museum #BecauseofHer (Why Is Celia Cruz Called the Queen of Salsa? March 5, 2020 video)
Celia Cruz is one of the best known entertainers of the 20th century. With her nicknames of "La Guarachera de Cuba" (for the guarachas that made her famous in her native land), the "Queen of Salsa" and "The Queen of Latin Music," she inspired millions around the world with her music, her style, and her joy. She recorded 37 studio albums and numerous live albums and collaborations and won many awards, including two Grammys, three Latin Grammys, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (in 2016). She was born in Havana, Cuba to a father who worked on the railway and a mother who was a "homemaker." The oldest of 14 children in the house (three were her siblings), she remembers singing lullabies to the younger ones to help get them to sleep (Celia's mother remembers her daughter singing to herself starting at 9 or 10 months of age). Despite having won several radio competitions, Cruz attended the Normal School in Havana with the intent of becoming a literature teacher, something her father had encouraged her to do. It was only when an instructor told her that by being a singer she could make in one month what she could make in several years of teaching that she decided to pursue a career in the arts. She became famous singing with the Cuban group Sonora Matancera, which she was a part of from 1950 through 1965. It was there that she met her husband, Pedro Knight, who played the trumpet with the group and whom she married in 1962 (hear her talk (in Spanish) about what kept their relationship strong, as well as her thoughts on living a happy life, in this 1995 interview. The interview also includes a clip of the two singing a short, sweet a capella duo). Cruz left Cuba in 1960 after Fidel Castro took power in the Cuban Revolution. She first toured with Sonora Matancera in Mexico and then travelled to the United States, where she became a citizen. During her long, successful career, she recorded with Tito Puente, Regalo del alma (Gift From the Soul). Read more in her Los Angeles Times obituary, here.
Johnny Pacheco, Dolores del Río, Willie Colón, and more. In 1990 she finally returned to Cuba to perform at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base. While there she collected a small bag of Cuban dirt to take back with her to the United States, and with which she requested to be buried when she died. During her later years, Cruz continued performing and recording albums, and she also began to appear in television shows and movies. She died at her home in Fort Lee, New Jersey in 2003. Her last album, recorded after she underwent surgery for the brain tumor that would take her life, was called
For resources for teaching Spanish, Level 1 through AP, CLICK HERE.
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| Celia Cruz and husband of 42 years Pedro Knight in 1998. Photo from the 2007 New York Times story Amid the Gravestones, A Final Love Song |
Celia Cruz is one of the best known entertainers of the 20th century. With her nicknames of "La Guarachera de Cuba" (for the guarachas that made her famous in her native land), the "Queen of Salsa" and "The Queen of Latin Music," she inspired millions around the world with her music, her style, and her joy. She recorded 37 studio albums and numerous live albums and collaborations and won many awards, including two Grammys, three Latin Grammys, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (in 2016). She was born in Havana, Cuba to a father who worked on the railway and a mother who was a "homemaker." The oldest of 14 children in the house (three were her siblings), she remembers singing lullabies to the younger ones to help get them to sleep (Celia's mother remembers her daughter singing to herself starting at 9 or 10 months of age). Despite having won several radio competitions, Cruz attended the Normal School in Havana with the intent of becoming a literature teacher, something her father had encouraged her to do. It was only when an instructor told her that by being a singer she could make in one month what she could make in several years of teaching that she decided to pursue a career in the arts. She became famous singing with the Cuban group Sonora Matancera, which she was a part of from 1950 through 1965. It was there that she met her husband, Pedro Knight, who played the trumpet with the group and whom she married in 1962 (hear her talk (in Spanish) about what kept their relationship strong, as well as her thoughts on living a happy life, in this 1995 interview. The interview also includes a clip of the two singing a short, sweet a capella duo). Cruz left Cuba in 1960 after Fidel Castro took power in the Cuban Revolution. She first toured with Sonora Matancera in Mexico and then travelled to the United States, where she became a citizen. During her long, successful career, she recorded with Tito Puente, Regalo del alma (Gift From the Soul). Read more in her Los Angeles Times obituary, here.
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| Photo from celiacruz.com |
For resources for teaching Spanish, Level 1 through AP, CLICK HERE.
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