Antonio Arcaño Betancorut

Flutist and orchestra conductor, known by the nickname "The Monarch of the Danzón".

Antonio Arcaño was born in La Habana. He began studies in music theory and harmony with Armando Romeu Marrero, and flute with his cousin José Antonio Díaz, whom he substituted for when he mastered the instrument in the orchestra of Antonio María Romeu.

His professional debut took place at the cabaret La Bombilla; later he worked at La Panera de Monte Carlo.

In his training as a danzón musician, his contact with Pedro López, the brothers Orestes and Coralia López, and Francisco Delabart ("Panchito Flauta Mágica") was decisive.

In the early 1930s he worked with the orchestra of the Galatea dance academy. He obtained a permanent position in the orchestra of Armando Valdespí, until he joined the Gris orchestra, led by pianist and composer Armando Valdés Torres.

He later worked at the Academia Sport Antillano, where he met Arsenio Rodríguez, who worked there with his ensemble, and Fernando Collazo, who directed his orchestra Maravilla del Siglo, founded in 1935.

Arcaño left the Gris orchestra and became musical director of the Maravilla del Siglo, which had excellent musicians: Ricardo Reverón on piano; Virgilio Diago and Elizardo Aroche, violinists; Rodolfo O'Farrill on bass; Ulpiano Díaz on timpani, and Oscar Pelegrín on güiro. He remained in Collazo's orchestra until November 1937.

He founded his first orchestra –La Maravilla de Arcaño– with Jesús López on piano; Israel López "Cachao" on bass; Ulpiano Díaz on timpani; Raúl Valdés and Elizardo Aroche on violins, and Oscar Pelegrín on güiro. By the end of 1939, the orchestra was called Arcaño y sus Maravillas.

With that group sang Miguelito García, René Márquez, René Álvarez, Gerardo Pedroso, Rafael Ortiz "Mañungo" and Miguelito Cuní. Its repertoire included danzónes by Silvio Contreras, Armando Valdés Torres, Ricardo Reverón and Juan Quevedo.

The orchestra's theme song at that time was the habanera La paloma by Sebastián Yradier. In the late 1930s, it premiered the first danzónes written by violinist Enrique Jorrín; among them Arcoiris sobre el Hudson, his first composition.

At the threshold of 1940 Arcaño eliminated the singers and dedicated himself to the performance of instrumental danzónes. He introduced "his new rhythm" thanks to compositions by excellent musicians who were also composers: Israel "Cachao" and Orestes López, Miguel Tachit, Félix Reina and Enrique Jorrín.

The "new rhythm" consisted of using the syncopated rhythmic cell in the last part (or montuno) of the danzón. It was the audience that dictated the style of the orchestra, as has been said, since dancers wanted to change from the smooth rhythm of the danzón to a faster and more marked one. The classical danzón formula was reduced from the ABACAD pattern –where A was the soft part of the bridge, which was not danced, the sieve– to formulas that remained in the simple introduction, a second slow theme, and then a long montuno. Although other charangas also did this, Arcaño was a pioneer in the rhythmic change.

Despite obtaining less profit when playing in the "societies of color", he used to do it more than at other dances, since there his group gained experience from a musical point of view, as it had to play for more creative dancers. Arcaño was the first charanga director who included the tumbadora in his formation.

The motto of the orchestra during its period of greatest success was "an ace on each instrument and a marvel in its ensemble". In one year, it had a record difficult to match, as it played at 404 dances.

He had his radio program, sponsored by Gravi toothpaste and Dermos soap, on the Mil Diez station. At the announcer's call, "Ready Arcaño, use Dermos" the orchestra would begin to play.

He made numerous recordings, but would assure years later, now retired, that the records did not reflect what his orchestra really was. A record lasted around two minutes and 45 seconds, and his danzónes at a dance lasted from eight to eleven minutes. It was not until the early 1980s that –leading an orchestra made up of musicians from other groups– he directed a series of recordings with longer danzónes.

For his performances on Mil Diez station, the orchestra was called Radiofónica, especially when expanded in the string section. The musicians of Arcaño's Radiofónica were: Elio Valdés, Antonio Sánchez, Enrique Jorrín, Salvador Muñoz, Félix Reyna, Fausto Muñoz and Pedro Hernández (violins); Raúl Valdés and Miguel Valdés (violas); Orestes López and Rodolfo O'Farrill (cello); Gustavo Tamayo and Julio Pedroso (güiro); Jesús López (piano), Israel López "Cachao" (bass) and Eliseo Pozo "El colorao" (tumbadora), and Antonio Arcaño, flutist and conductor. The complexity of the arrangements and the search for new timbres meant that occasionally other instruments were added to the Radiofónica, such as celesta, campanólogo and organ.

With the orchestra Melodías del 40 and the ensemble of Arsenio Rodríguez, they formed the so-called group of "the three great ones", those who convened the greatest amount of audience at the gigantic dances organized in the gardens of La Tropical and other breweries.

These were the years of the Second World War, and as the meetings of Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin began to be called "meetings of the Three Great", they adopted the same name.

In 1945 Arcaño stopped playing the flute for health reasons, and brought his cousin José Antonio Díaz to the orchestra. His group established the conducive atmosphere for Enrique Jorrín to create the cha cha chá. He made recordings around 1953 with the vocal quartet Musicabana, which included young musicians linked to the filin expression of Cuban song.

Arcaño's orchestra popularized versions of many works from the symphonic repertoire, which resonated with dancers: from Antonio Sánchez Reyes, Los bombines (Piano Concerto No. 1 by Chaikovsky); from José Esteban Urfé, María Eugenia (Piano Concerto in A minor by Grieg); from Orestes López, Rapsodia en azul (Rhapsody in Blue by George Gershwin); from Israel López, Canta, contrabajo (Sad Song by Serguei Koussevitzky); from Dora Herrera, Siempre te he querido (Prelude in C-sharp minor by Serguei Rachmaninov); from Miguel Tachit, La viuda alegre (Waltz from The Merry Widow by Franz Lehar), among many others.

In several of his danzónes were included popular songs from North American musical films, or Cuban songs and sones: Arcaño y su ritmo nuevo by Antonio Sánchez (which includes Mi china ayer me botó by Arsenio Rodríguez); Broadway by Orestes López (Serenade in Blue, a success by Glenn Miller from the film Orchestra Wives) and Doña Olga by Enrique Jorrín (Boda gris by Pedro Flores).

The Arcaño y sus Maravillas Orchestra played for the last time at a dance in the town of Alquízar in 1958, the year in which "The Monarch" decided to dedicate himself to teaching classes in labor unions and music schools, and to training new interpreters of the danzón.

Antonio Arcaño was a collaborator of the Center for Folkloric Research, directed by pianist and musicologist Odilio Urfé and, after the revolutionary triumph of 1959, worked as an advisor to the Company of Recordings and Musical Editions.

He died on June 18, 1994.