# Tomás Morales Villena

**Date of birth:** December 21, 1936

**Date of death:** July 11, 2019

**Categories:** Arts, Music, Dance, dancer, choreographer, Singer, Society, professor

First-level graduate as a musical comedian. Founder of the Experimental Dance Ensemble, he began as an amateur dancer at the Television School and later expanded his studies in dance, ballet and jazz under the guidance of Luis Trápaga and choreography with Argentine Carlos Sandor.

He was awarded the National Dance Prize in 2010.

As a dancer he performed at Tropicana under the direction of Rodney and Armando Zuez, and later made his debut as choreographer and co-director of that nightclub, a position he held for 16 years, alongside Joaquín Riviera and Joaquín M. Condal. Among his productions for the Tropicana cabaret (image) are Carnaval de Lecuona, Son y ritmo, Tropicana canta y baila para usted, Barcelona y Cuba and Los romanos eran así.

Tomás Morales, a great master who has devoted his life to art without rest. A student of Luis Trápaga, to whom he felt indebted, whom he mentioned with gratitude and respect many times in conversation, but also of Alberto Alonso, Tomás Morales has been a singer, pedagogue, dancer, actor, choreographer, artistic director, screenwriter.

He began at the famous Sans Souci cabaret, with Alberto Alonso, he recalls emotionally, he was on television where he worked with Trápaga and Alonso; at the Havana Musical Theater, in several cabarets throughout Cuba, including the Continental in Varadero, but especially the Tropicana Cabaret, where he was an undisputed figure, a classic of the specialty, with choreographies that were presented to the public every night, applauded to the point of ovation and premiered in various parts of the world.

Tomás Morales was dance partner of Cristy Domínguez, on Cuban TV, his last partner, his unforgettable partner, an indisputable paradigm that still moves us when we see them in archival images. He has sung with Esther Borja, with Omara Portuondo and other figures of song in the most important Cuban television programs, from the fifties, and after the triumph of the Revolution.

Awards and Recognition
Artist of Merit of the National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC), distinguished with the Lorna Burdsall recognition, with the Gitana Tropical and the National Dance Prize, among many other recognitions.
He has been honored with the Nicolás Guillén Distinction and the Raúl Gómez García Medal.