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Ruben Gonzalez
by Beowulf Mayfield
Described by one critic as a 'cross between Thelonious Monk and Felix The Cat', Cuban pianist Ruben Gonzalez had to wait until the age of 77 to make his first solo album. Introducing... Ruben Gonzales
was recorded for World Circuit in Havana in two days of leftover studio time following the completion of Grammy-winning album Buena Vista Social Club
and Juan De Marcos Gonzalez' Afro-Cuban All-Stars' album A Toda Cuba Le Gusta
, for my money, it's one of the best piano albums ever made.
Ruben was born in 1919 in a small Cuban village and took piano lessons, visiting his teacher once a month and learning classical pieces at a rate of knots. He could have gone on to study as a concert pianst but he chose to focus on Cuba's own son style. He also wanted to be a doctor but, luckily for the music world, everyone who heard him play begged him to continue with music.
He moved to Havana in 1941 and subsequently, in Ruben's own words, "played with almost all of Cuba", travelling all over the country. He worked with many great Cuban bandleaders, was instrumental in the development of the cha-cha-cha style while working as pianist in Enrique Jorrin's orchestra. He subsquently became the band's musical director after Jorrin's death although he did not really enjoy the role. He subsequently retired in the early 1990s but never lost the urge to play music.
According to the album sleeve notes, Ruben no longer owned a piano in 1996 - his own had fallen apart - and during the making of Buena Vista Social Club and A Toda Cuba le Gusta he would turn up at the Havana studio first thing in the morning simply to play the smart grand piano there. How much of this is the stuff of modern legend, I'm not sure, but the evidence on album shows an extrordinarily agile piano player and inventive improviser.
Ruben followed this up with Chanchullo
, released in 2000, which is a much more lush album. It features Cuban violin player Lazaro Ordonez Enriquez, who sadly died shortly after the session, who, along with flute player Richard Egues, makes the album's version of Central Constancia by Enrique Jorrin into one of the lovliest and most delicate pieces of music I have ever heard.
Ruben showed up on the 1999 Buena Vista Social Club film
playing away to his heart's content on an upright piano in the corner of a Havana ballroom fallen on bad times. A group of little girls are having a dance class under the great chandeliers and Ruben is playing merrily away. Towards the end of the film, we see Ruben walking on stage at Carnegie Hall and sitting down at a huge concert grand piano - and he plays exactly the same piece we heard him play on the old upright. To me, this says something about a man who is concerned about one thing - the music, the time and place are not really important.
Ruben Gonzales died on Monday, December 8, 2003.
Albums by Ruben Gonzalez can be purchased from Amazon by clicking on the title links below:
Introducing Ruben Gonzales | Chanchullo
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