Icons of Cuba’s “Golden Age” of music from the 1940s and 50s, Los Guaracheros de Oriente were cultural ambassadors whose irresistible and patented sound traveled around the world, influencing generations of Latin musicians everywhere, and as such, they could be considered among the progenitors of salsa. The group was founded in Santiago de Cuba in the mid-1940s by talented singer-songwriter Benito Antonio Fernández Ortiz (1902 – 1982), better known as Ñico Saquito. Along with Trio Matamoros, they were one of Cuba’s most enduring and beloved purveyors of the guitar-based trova oriental sound from the island’s eastern region. From his first success, “Cuidadito Compay Gallo,” which was originally a hit for Trio Matamoros, to his many famous songs performed with Los Guaracheros, and on his own as a solo artist, Ñico Saquito’s compositions live on today and are considered “standards” of typical, authentic Cuban music. Though small in stature, Saquito’s talent rendered him a giant of Cuban song.

Although Saquito was originally the band’s leader, he mostly sang backup chorus and kept a steady rhythm with minor percussion, while a succession of lead singers fronted the group in its early years. The diminutive Félix ‘El Gallego’ Escobar was one of those lead vocalists and eventually took over that position for good. He also played a small set of timbales with cowbell attached called the ‘timablito.’ The rakishly mustachioed Gerardo ‘El Chino’ Macías held first guitar position and sang tenor backup coro. Indeed it is El Chino’s spine-tingling guitar leads that distinguished Los Guaracheros’ sound and helped inspire African popular music styles from Ghanaian highlife to Congolese rumba (and later soukous). The quartet was rounded out by rhythm guitarist Florencio ‘Pícolo’ Santana, who also sang baritone coro and was the tallest of the group. Even though Macías and Santana played acoustic guitars, they were amplified with electric pickups so the effect was bright and strong, sounding more like an electric guitar and adding a percussive attack that enhanced the intense rhythmic pulse of their arrangements. As “guaracheros,” the quartet were known for their varied lyric repertoire which spanned the gamut from poetic to bawdy, folksy to heartbreaking, always delivered in an effortless style propelled by compelling counterpoint harmonies, all of which was no doubt the core of their appeal among their avid transnational Spanish-speaking audience.

Throughout the first part of their career Los Guaracheros recorded for various Cuban and American labels, though their most prolific run was with Ansonia Records in the second half of their seven decades as a band. One of their most successful contracts starting in 1953 lasted for three years at Havana’s famous Tropicana nightclub. When that stint finished, Saquito left the group to go solo, deciding to remain in Havana after the Cuban Revolution, while Escobar assumed the musical direction of the remaining trio in exile. After touring the US, Los Guaracheros eventually settled in Puerto Rico in the early 1960s. Though San Juan was their base of operations, they also spent three busy years in Miami, Florida, playing residencies in various hotels, and toured extensively in an exhaustive international itinerary that saw them pass through cities from Madrid to Maracaibo where their fans were legion.

The trio would always keep their old amigo and former leader Ñico Saquito’s compositions at the forefront of their repertoire, recording their debut album for Ansonia in 1963 and their seventh and final volume in 1979, the majority of which featured a good number of Saquito’s ditties. In 1997 Macías died, followed by Santana five years later. Determined to continue, Escobar maintained Los Guaracheros for a decade longer before Los Guaracheros were finally retired with Escobar’s death in 2006, though their music endures to this day. It’s no understatement to say Ñico Saquito and Los Guaracheros de Oriente made an immense and crucial contribution to Latin music history (and especially to typical Cuban music) with a vast body of work that remains as vital and important today as it did when they were in their prime more than half a century ago.

Los Guaracheros de Oriente’s second volume for Ansonia followed swiftly on the heels of the first, and featured a similar sound and repertoire. Recorded in San Juan on October 29, 1964 but not released until March of 1965, the album covers a few Cuban classics of yesteryear but, in contrast with the first volume, consists mostly of new tunes. As usual, the guarachas are very fiery and upbeat, and three are composed by one of the band’s former lead vocalists, the Venezuelan singer/songwriter Pedro ‘Guajiro’ González (who also recorded for Ansonia at the time with Kito Vélez y Sus Estrellas). Stepping into the limelight this time, Alejandro ‘El Negro’ Vivar takes a number of sweltering trumpet solos, utilizing the mute like a wah-wah guitar. The album kicks off with “Lo Tuyo Y Lo Mío,” a dance friendly guaracha written by Cuarteto Marcano’s Claudio Ferrer, one of Puerto Rico’s most successful and prolific composers who also was a frequent, popular recording artist for Ansonia in his own right. The tune later became a salsa hit for Ray Barretto in 1984. Ferrer has another hot guaracha on the album, “La Resbalosa,” which was also covered by Ray Barretto in 1987 for Fania Records. “Tu Son” has the “typical Cuban sound” of the rural guajiro (peasant) and is a fine example of the genre that was so highly influential in Africa as well as South America. Also of note is a song that was new to Los Guaracheros’ repertoire, lead singer Félix Escobar’s bolero “Saludos A Puerto Rico,” where the trio pays tribute to their current host country. And, just as on their first record for Ansonia, the trio also included a merengue, the buoyant “Trinar,” a fun track that features a playful lyrical theme of birds dancing to the beat.

It’s not hard to see why Ansonia Records continued to support Los Guaracheros de Oriente with another five releases beyond this second volume. The trio remained popular throughout the 1960s and maintained their international audience with a consistently excellent discography representing their signature sound with a brace of high quality recordings that spanned two decades. Now this vintage catalog is being remastered by Ansonia and today’s audience will no doubt be as entranced by the pungent potpourri of authentic Cuban flavor in its grooves as its original fans were in the past.

-Pablo Yglesias