Amaury Pérez Vidal Receives the 2025 National Music Prize

April 7, 2026

Cuban singer-songwriter and troubadour Amaury Pérez Vidal received on April 4, 2026, the 2025 National Music Prize, the highest honor awarded by the Cuban Institute of Music of the Ministry of Culture of Cuba. The ceremony took place at the Cuban Art Building of the National Museum of Fine Arts in Havana, in the presence of President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez.

The prize was presented by Culture Minister Alpidio Alonso Grau and the president of the Cuban Institute of Music, Indira Fajardo. Jury president Digna Guerra praised Pérez Vidal as a founding member of the Nueva Trova movement, recognizing his work as a composer, performer, producer, writer, and host of cultural programs. The jury acknowledged him as one of the most important Cuban composers of the second half of the 20th century, author of more than 500 songs collected in over 40 albums.

Visibly moved, Amaury Pérez Vidal recalled his beginnings in 1969, when at just 15 years old he set poems by Fayad Jamís and Otto Fernández to music. "I never aspired to decorations or honors, and I never imagined that my friends and colleagues would award me the National Music Prize," he said. He closed the ceremony with classic trova performances alongside other troubadours. Among those present were Silvio Rodríguez, Frank Fernández, José María Vitier, Pancho Amat, and Abel Prieto, who called the award "an act of justice" toward one of the essential creators of Cuban national culture.