Antonio María Romeu Marrero

Renowned Cuban pianist, composer, and orchestra director. One of the classic creators of the danzon.

He was born in Jibacoa, a town near La Habana. He was the most prolific of the danzon composers. He began his music studies at the age of eight with the presbyter Joaquín Mariano Martínez, who allowed him to study on the harmonium at the church in Jibacoa.

He later continued his training in a self-taught manner. At twelve years old he composed a mazurka, his first work for piano; by then he was already playing the instrument at dances and parties.

On August 5, 1887, he made his debut as a pianist at the Casino Español in the town of Aguacate, performing the danzon Cariño, no hay mejor café que el de Puerto Rico.

On January 22, 1899, he moved to La Habana, and on the night of his arrival he performed danzones on piano at the café La Diana, accompanied by a güiro. In that establishment he composed his first danzon, Ten Dollars o Ten Days.

According to Cuban chronicler and composer Rosendo Rosell, in 1904 Antonio María Romeu—assisted by violinist Juan Quevedo and his brother Armando Romeu, then fourteen years old, as the güiro player—recorded Edison cylinders for the house Mosquera, located on O'Reilly Street in La Habana.

The danzon, from the 1870s through the 1910s, was performed by "típica" orchestras, consisting fundamentally of wind instruments (cornet, valve trombone, baritone, two clarinets), two violins, double bass, two kettle drums (or timpani), and güiro.

Romeu has frequently been credited with creating the orchestral format known as "charanga francesa," which retains the two violins, double bass, and güiro of the "típica," but replaces the timpani with smaller kettle drums (called criollas pailas), and substitutes wind instruments with a five-key wooden flute and piano.

The charangas francesas (called thus, apparently, identifying "the French" as delicate and exquisite) gradually eliminated the competition from the típica orchestras until they disappeared. Romeu played piano for the first time in a danzon ensemble with the orchestra of flutist Leopoldo Cervantes.

In 1900 he began performing at the central café Manzanares. Between 1904 and 1910 he was part of the charanga of Tata Alfonso, a musician who incorporated clave songs and guaguancó into the danzon.

In 1909 he premiered his famous danzon El barbero de Sevilla, in which he used fragments from Rossini's opera of the same name. He also based his danzon compositions on Cuban popular melodies, sones, rumbas, boleros, and songs.

According to most researchers, Romeu founded his own orchestra in 1911, with Feliciano Facenda (violin), Alfredo Valdés Brito (flute), Rafael Calazán (double bass), Remigio Valdés (kettle drum), and Félix Vázquez (güiro).

In 1916 he began recording discs for the Columbia and RCA Víctor companies. From that first period of Romeu's charanga comes the recording of the danzon of his authorship Ojos triunfadores (1918), some of whose motifs were used in 1920 and 1921 by French composer Darius Milhaud in his work Saudades do Brasil.

Romeu's was the danzon orchestra that made the largest number of recordings in the era of acoustic technology. In many of those early phonograph recordings, Armando Romeu—also a composer—participated, playing the alto saxophone or clarinet. Armando Romeu's participation became more prominent in the records the charanga made starting in 1925, the year it began recording using the electrical system.

In 1922 Antonio María Romeu became part of the newly founded Sociedad Solidaria Musical de La Habana. In 1926, Amadeo Roldán worked with fragments of his works in the final part of "Fiesta negra" from Tres pequeños poemas. In 1929, Romeu's charanga records were awarded prizes at the International Fair of Seville.

After the first danzonete was premiered in the city of Matanzas (Rompiendo la rutina, by Aniceto Díaz), Romeu composed several pieces in that genre. From 1930 onwards he introduced singers into his orchestra; initially in duos: Fernando Collazo and Enrique García; Rogelio Martínez and Caíto (Carlos Díaz Alonso), singers from the Sonora Matancera; Antonio Machín and Daniel Sánchez; Siro Rodríguez and Miguel Matamoros. On some occasions he also backed solo singers, such as Collazo and the troubadour Guyún (Vicente González Rubiera).

Starting in 1931 he performed regularly on the radio program La hora múltiple, broadcast by the station La Voz de las Antillas. The station El Progreso Cubano—now Radio Progreso—contracted his orchestra for years, while Antonio María also performed as a solo pianist on the daily program La hora íntima, where he came to be called "The wizard of the keys."

Although he included singers in his charanga's performances and recordings, Romeu continued playing and composing instrumental danzones, which he alternated with sung versions.

In 1937 the singer Barbarito Diez joined the orchestra, having previously performed troubadour songs and boleros with tres player Isaac Oviedo and guitarist Graciano Gómez.

In the Cuban film Estampas habaneras, premiered on April 10, 1939, Romeu performed Tres lindas cubanas (based on a son by Guillermo Castillo of the Sexteto Habanero), the first danzon that included a piano solo.

Regarding piano solos, the maestro narrated in an interview that during a party at the society Unión Fraternal, and since he had not been able to write the announced danzon, he wrote out two parts of the piece for the musicians to perform, who were to interrupt their performance at a signal from him, as he would continue alone on piano. The improvisation of colorful and rhythmic embellishments captivated the dancers and captured their attention powerfully; from then on the custom of improvised solos in the danzon began, characteristic of his style.

Between 1939 and 1940 the charanga recorded several bolero-sones and danzonetes, with Barbarito Diez as the singer, but in the last year Romeu decided to stop using voices in his orchestra.

When the station RHC Cadena Azul contracted him to perform on its programs, the maestro added the sound of trumpet, valve trombone, and clarinet to his charanga, and renamed the ensemble in 1945 as "giant orchestra." He made several recordings in that format for RCA Víctor, but stopped making discs in 1947.

In 1950 he ceased his performances as a pianist and dedicated himself to composition and orchestration.

In the year 1954, in the midst of the chachachá boom—a rhythm that once again popularized the sound of charangas—Romeu's orchestra reappeared, true to the danzon, then directed by his son, violinist Antonio María Romeu Jr. It backed the voice of Barbarito Diez in boleros and songs "arranged" in danzon style, on Cuban records from the Panart label in a collection titled Así bailaba Cuba (for instrumental pieces) and Así cantaba Cuba (for records with sung numbers).

Antonio María Romeu composed more than five hundred danzones, some of enormous popularity, such as Marcheta (with interesting work in percussion), Alemán, prepara tu cañón, Eva, Siglo XX, La danza de los millones, El servicio obligatorio, Cinta azul, El mago de las teclas, Jibacoa, Ay, que me vengo cayendo, Los frescos, and La flauta mágica, in collaboration with Alfredo Brito.

He made orchestrations for the musical time and structure of the danzon of many songs, including Guarina, by Sindo Garay; Me da miedo quererte, by Alberto Villalón; Mares y arenas, by Rosendo Ruiz; Mercedes, by Manuel Corona; Perla marina, by Sindo Garay; Aquella boca, by Eusebio Delfín, and La cleptómana, by Manuel Luna.

Antonio María Romeu died in La Habana on January 18, 1955.

Most of the recordings he made from 1935 onwards have been reissued on compact disc, and unfortunately very few from the acoustic period. His best-known piece is Tres lindas cubanas, which has been recorded by Cuban pianists from several generations.

Source: EnCaribe.org