Eduardo Saborit Pérez

Distinguished Cuban musician and composer.

He was born in Campechuela, in the eastern province of Granma, the son of a thoroughly musical family. His father, Eduardo Saborit Rodríguez, was a respectable musician and organ arranger who for years directed the Municipal Music Band.

From childhood, he showed aptitude for music. His father was his first teacher, who taught him to play the flute, an essential instrument in the only large-format group that existed in that area.

He learned to play both the flute and clarinet interchangeably, so he often traveled with the Band during its tours through the territories of the southeastern coast of the Island.

Being still very young, he contracted a serious illness that prevented him from continuing to play wind instruments. In light of medical advice, Saborit devoted himself to learning the instrument that would accompany him throughout his life: the guitar.

As a consequence of material difficulties, the Saborit family moved to Niquero in search of economic improvement, and the young man was forced to work in several trades, including barbering. He quickly became involved in the cultural life of the town, where he participated as an amateur in activities. There he married Zoila Raga, who was his lifelong companion.

His wife's family was known for their revolutionary concerns, and soon Eduardo also embraced the cause and joined the revolutionary groups in the area that fought against Machado's tyranny. For his actions against the government, he was expelled from Niquero and forced to move constantly throughout the country. During this journey he distinguished himself as a director of peasant groups and, to earn a living, he formed the trios Ensueño and Clave Azul.

He came to radio as a guitar concert performer and with knowledge of piano and clarinet obtained in his town and in Santiago de Cuba. He had a brief stint at the Camagüey broadcaster CMJK, the most important station in the territory during the forties of the last century. Later he joined the cast of Radio Cadena Azul of Amado Trinidad, in Santa Clara. There he popularized his song Guayabera. When the station moved its broadcasts to Havana, Eduardo Saborit also moved with the rest of the cast.

Once in the capital, he dedicated himself to composing music for commercial advertising, radio novels, and other radio programs. His first major success was part of the soundtrack of the radio novel Pepe Cortés and served to attract the attention of the owners of the powerful CMQ Circuit who hired him at a higher salary. At CMQ Radio (located at Monte and Prado) he participated in programs with large audiences; for example, the program Rincón Criollo whose main characters were Sol Pinelli and Emilio Medrado.

At the end of 1958 he composed the music for the famous jingle, written by Iris Dávila and popularized by Consuelito Vidal, which, under the pretext of RINA soap, moved the patriotic feelings of the nation and whose lyrics are still remembered by Cubans: "You must have faith that everything comes...And remember that faith moves mountains".

Among his most famous compositions is the musical piece titled "Know Cuba First", which achieved great popularity in the fifties. The lyrics reminded his countrymen of the immense wealth and beauty of their country. In exchange for the author's rights to the musical piece, he received a tempting offer from the ESSO company that was interested in using it for its advertising; but Saborit firmly refused the offer.

His commitment to the Cuban independence cause is clearly manifested in the musical work displayed throughout his entire life but, undoubtedly, his artistic career as a musician and composer was consolidated after the revolutionary triumph of January 1959. "¡Cuba, qué linda es Cuba!", his most widespread work, was the first song he composed to show his support for the revolutionary process. The piece was staged, sung, and recorded, in its initial phase, by the orchestra América, and has since been covered many times. It achieved worldwide reach when, at the VIII World Festival of Youth and Students, held in Helsinki (1962), Professor Cuca Rivero presented a version of the piece staged with the Choir of the National School of Art (ENA).

Saborit's connection to Cuba's political events included much more than his artistic career, as he also assumed active roles in the organization and execution of the plans outlined by the revolutionary government. In 1959 he traveled to Europe to attend the VII World Festival of Youth and Students in Vienna, Austria, and later visited France, Spain, and the former Soviet Union.

It was Jesús Orta Ruiz, El Indio Naiborí, who laid the foundation for relations with Celia Sánchez and Mario Díaz, key figures in the Cuban Literacy Campaign. From that moment on, he worked in the National Council of Literacy which had its offices in Ciudad Libertad (former Columbia Barracks), one of the barracks converted into schools after 1959. He also served on the Dissemination Commission. From this process emerged two of his most memorable compositions: "Despertar" and the "Hymn of the Conrado Benítez Brigades".

The latter was commissioned with little time before its premiere. Finally, it was sung for the first time on Mother's Day (second Sunday of May) in 1961, at the amphitheater in Varadero, when Fidel Castro said goodbye to a group of brigadistas who were departing to different regions of the country.

Also motivated by the Literacy Campaign carried out during 1961, Saborit composed the song "Despertar" or "I Have Learned to Read and Write", as it is also known. In general, the text reflects the joy of the people who benefited from the reach of literacy and quickly became a kind of hymn written in the heat of the campaign. "Despertar" was premiered at the closing of an event held to evaluate the progress of the literacy offensive, at the Chaplin theater, now Karl Marx. Then, at Fidel Castro's request, the song was performed twice by singer Esther Borja; but the culminating point of its success was on December 22, 1961, the date when the central ceremony was held to declare Cuba "Illiteracy-free Territory". On that occasion, both compositions accompanied the brigadistas' entrance into Revolution Square. Other pieces related to the Literacy Campaign were composed by this author; among them were the "Hymn of Literacy", "Cumplimos", and the "Hymn of the Scholarship Holders".

Another form of collaboration with the educational project carried out by Saborit was the extensive journeys from Oriente to Santa Clara in which two large artistic brigades brought art and entertainment to the brigadistas camps. One of those brigades was led by this distinguished musician. These tours also served to continue his promotion of Cuban culture and, particularly, of peasant culture.

From 1961 onwards, and even after the Campaign ended, Saborit wore only the uniform of the brigadistas. As he said, he had devoted himself so much to the literacy project that he didn't want to take off that clothing.

Eduardo Saborit was one of the most performed Cuban composers in the second half of the twentieth century. He ventured into a wide variety of musical genres: boleros, sones, songs, sucu-sucu, guarachas, hymns, and patriotic marches. Among his most popular pieces are also: "Tócalo con limón", "Tengo miedo de ti", "Caridad", "Ponme la mano", "El caballo y la montura"; as well as the hymns of May 1st and of the Militiaman.

He died prematurely in March 1963. That day, at the Necrópolis Cristóbal Colón, Cuban poet Jesús Orta Ruiz, El Indio Naborí, said goodbye to the mourning with verses of an elegy dedicated to his memory. In his verses he says:

For having deep roots, for bringing joy to peasants,
for desiring paths, full of happy children;
for warning:
"You who say that your Homeland is not so beautiful"
and for dying in the footsteps
of Fidel and Martí,
take, my brother, "a ruby,
five stripes and a star".

At the farewell, he received as a posthumous offering an enormous wreath in the shape of a guitar, and a choir directed by Professor Cuca Rivero sang his emblematic piece "Despertar".

Shortly after his death, Studio 3 of the old CMQ, now the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television, was named in his honor; as was an annual Traditional and Peasant Music competition held in the country that brings together young musicians and composers (Eduardo Saborit In Memoriam Traditional and Peasant Music Competition).