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Piano Merengues Vol. 1

by Damirón

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Tugurucutu 02:50

about

Frank Damirón (born Francisco Alberto Simó Damirón,1908 -1992) was a Dominican pianist, composer, and arranger who shined as a virtuoso through his playing style that fused merengue with other elements of Latin popular music and left his mark as the best performer of piano-merengues. He is widely known for forming one half of the legendary merengue duo, Damirón y Chapuseaux who helped to internationalize Dominican merengue in different parts of Latin America and the Caribbean. Damirón attended the Santa Ana Academy in his hometown of San Francisco de Macorís, where as a young boy he played trombone for a local jazz orchestra. Later, he attended the University of Santo Domingo where he studied engineering, but three years in, he decided to switch to piano. In 1933, Damirón began performing three times a week on the HIT radio station program “El Hit del Aire” in Santo Domingo. That same year, he formed his first band called Simó Damirón y su Jazz Band, performing in Haiti and Puerto Rico. In 1935, Damirón returned to Santo Domingo, where he met José Ernesto “El Negrito” Chapuseaux on the HI4D radio station program “La Voz de Quisqueya.” They performed “Orquídeas a la luz de la luna” live on the radio, which became their first local hit.

In 1936, Damirón and Chapuseaux joined their good friend Billo Frómeta’s Santo Domingo Jazz Band and in 1937 the band would leave on a historic trip to where the duo remained for six months. They decided to split from the band and go their own way, travelling to Colombia then Panama in search of better opportunities. In Panama, Chapuseaux met and married the Panamanian singer and actress Silvia de Grasse who became an integral part of their act. Damirón, Chapuseaux, and De Grasse returned to Cuidad Trujillo (Santo Domingo) in 1945 to perform live on the radio station “La Voz del Yuna,” where Damirón was the director of the Super Orchestra San José for a short time. In 1949, Damirón alongside Chapuseaux and De Grasse would try their luck in New York City and Damirón's first engagement in the city was at the famed Havana-Madrid nightclub (according to the original liner notes). The move to the city would prove successful due to the hit record “La Maricutana,” a merengue which they recorded in Puerto Rico with Armando and his Jack’s Band for Seeco Records in 1947. The song was so popular the duo was crowned “Los Reyes del Merengue y la Maricutana.” Their interpretation of Dominican merengues at this time were stylistically different because they introduced instruments like maracas which are not traditionally used in Dominican merengues. In the early 1950s Damirón emerged as a solo act while leading the house band at the Ben Maksik’s Town and Country Club in Brooklyn, NY. In addition, he was quite in demand recording with Chapuseaux and as a soloist for the following recording labels Seeco, Landia, Atlantic, RCA Victor, Toreador, and Fiesta to name a few. Damirón demonstrated his range as a soloist by being adept at playing many popular Afro-Cuban tunes with accented arrangements that allowed him to creatively mix merengue with mambo like the tune “Mambengue” released by Fiesta Records in 1955. By 1955 Damirón and Chapuseaux were household names in the city and for their twentieth anniversary as a duo they received the “Copa de Ángel Viloria” from Dominican promoter Virgilio Dalmau at the Palladium Ballroom on November 5, 1955. The award was instituted by Virgilio and given to Dominican artists who contributed to the dissemination of Dominican folklore in the city. In 1956, Damirón would take the next step creatively as a soloist by recording the single “Piano Merengue,” a successful hit that led to three recorded albums for Ralph Pérez’s Ansonia Records. Damirón moved to Puerto Rico in 1967 with Chapuseaux and De Grasse where they would become known as Los Alegres Tres. The trio was hired by Paquito Navarro to perform on the Telemundo program “El Show de las 12" and for years captivated audiences in Puerto Rico until the death of Silvia de Grasse in 1978. Damirón remained active until his death in Santo Domingo on April 3, 1992.

Piano Merengues Vol. 1 (ALP 1213) is Damirón’s seminal first album, and it is recognized as a pioneering recording for introducing an instrumental repertoire of traditional Dominican merengues and original compositions as piano-merengues. Damirón’s gifted piano artistry is on full display on the twelve outstanding merengues on this album. Recorded at the famous Beltone studios and released in 1956, the album features some of the original members of Ángel Viloria y su Conjunto Típico Cibaeño; Willie Sosías (bass), Luis Quintero (tambora), and Jaime Richetti on güira. In addition, the formidable singing talents on the chorus of Yayo “El Indio,” Cuso Mendoza, Santos Colón, and Chaguín García. Damirón is heard playing a remarkable set of chords on these merengue melodies that include some room for improvisation that really move along at a fast clip. The basic structure and instrumentation was an important departure stylistically due to how ubiquitous the urban conjunto típico sound had become in the city by 1956. The album includes the popular classic “Piano Merengue,” a good tempo and highly danceable tune that Damirón plays smoothly throughout. Another fun track is “Que Siga La Fiesta,” an exciting instrumental with a catchy chorus at mid point delivered in a manner that anyone could sing along to while still enjoying the piano riding in the background. In addition, the lovely “Si Me Vas A Querer” is a lifting and danceable number with a joyful chorus at mid-point to keep everyone on their feet. “La Escalerita” and “El Ají Caribe,” composed by the legendary Dr. Manuel Sanchez Acosta, are infectiously orchestrated bringing out the deft merengue beat, but also the bouncy and pronounced improvisations of Luis Quintero and Damirón. Some other fantastic tunes that are played without much of a break in melody are “Merengue Minuet” and “Merengue Melodico.” In contrast, there are several instrumentals that are more mid-tempo piano-merengues, such as “Bien Apretaito,” “Ritmo del Merengue,” “Piano, Guira, Y Tambora,” and “Tugurucutu.”

This album provided a template for other great Latin pianists to record their own interpretations and styling of piano-merengues, including pianists like Johnny Conquet, Sonny Ovalle, Rafael Solano, Ramón Orlando, Joe Loco, among others.

-Jhensen Ortiz

credits

released October 8, 1956

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