Enrique Corona

Kiki Corona, Cuban singer and composer, member of the Nueva Trova movement. He has also worked in film music composition, adding to the extensive list of his works the musical score for the film Sabor latino.

As a singer he has been invited to recording projects in Brazil, alongside figures such as Lela Piñeiros, Claudio Nussi, Marco André and Paolo Vallessi and in Italy. He has produced albums for prestigious Cuban performers such as Elena Burke, Luis Téllez, Paulo Fernández Gallo, David Torrens; for vocal groups Ecos, Exaudi, Coralina and Vocalité and for the group Mayohuacán.

His musical life began in his home where on weekends and invariably, all those he called at that time Uncles would gather: César Portillo de la Luz, José Antonio Mendes, Chucho Valdés, Chicho Manfugaz, Teresita Fernández, Ñico Rojas, Manolito Armesto (calandraca) and many troubadours, singers and intellectuals, who held their Saturday gatherings from afternoon until dawn. That's how it all began.

There and alongside his siblings, he was gently invited to sing songs accompanied on guitar by his father when he was barely 6 or 7 years old. His Dad, who in the 1940s was part of Trío Habana and Trío Urquiza, though he later dedicated himself entirely to his profession, was an impressive singer and guitarist. From his father, he learned to play guitar and later at the Alejandro García Caturla conservatory, though studying clarinet; he could not have had better fortune than to count on the instruction in guitar from the Master: Clarita Nicola.

In 1976 he joined the Nueva Trova movement with the group Río Negro, singing as a duo with Xiomara Laugart songs from the Latin American musical repertoire, directed by professor Luis Ramírez Zúñiga. By 1978 he became part of the group Canto Libre.

Artistic Career
By this time he was a student of masters Abelardo Bosh, Carlos Emilio Morales, Leopoldina Núñez, Armando Romeu, who taught him classes in composition, orchestration, counterpoint, harmony and popular guitar.

Starting in 1983 he began a more active life within the Cuban cultural world, as he shares stages with professional artists and became part of the Ecos vocal octet, directed by singer and professor Argelia Fragoso.

He began creating incidental music for serial programs on Cuban television and radio. In the following years (1984 to 1986) he presented his works to different competitive events where he was awarded with various prizes.

Celia Torriente, Enriqueta Almanza and Ileana Vázquez requested children's songs from him. The first songs were "trial and error" in approaching children's music, some of them are now 35 years old, such is the case of La Nana de las Mariposas. You ask me why and I wouldn't know how to answer well, because if there was a reason then; today it is so imprinted in my desires and affections, that at this point in my life, they form inseparable parts of my architecture as a creator. The truth is that I could not exist nor express myself entirely, if I do not do it with a children's song, the composer has said.

Many adventures, children's series, police stories and tales carry his music.

As of September 1988 he joined the group Mayohuacán as a singer and composer, with which he performs concerts throughout the country and abroad. Furthermore, this group, on several occasions, has been the performer of the bases of the soundtracks that Kiki Corona created for Cuban Television and for TV Azteca until 1991, when he assumed his own project, with a musical group that accompanies him.

Kiki Corona has also worked in film music composition, adding to the extensive list of his works the musical score for the film Sabor latino", a co-production of ICAIC (Cuba), Tutor Cine (Spain) and Tabasco Films (Mexico).

As a singer he has been invited to recording projects in Brazil and in Italy, alongside figures such as Lela Piñeiros, Claudio Nussi, Marco André and Paolo Vallessi. He has produced musical albums for prestigious Cuban performers such as Elena Burke, Paulo Fernández Gallo, Luis Téllez and David Torrens; for vocal groups Ecos, Exaudi, Coralina and Vocalité and for the group Mayohuacán.

Awards
1983: Prize awarded by the cultural publication Caimán Barbudo and Jury Mention for his musical composition "Te amé junto a la brisa" in the Adolfo Guzmán Contest of Cuban Music, performed by Anabel López.
1983: Music Prize from the Fourth Havana Theater Festival for the soundtrack of the theatrical work Asesinato en la Playita de 16.
1986: Second Prize in Composition, Jury Mention and other awards given by different press outlets and specialists for two finalist songs of the Adolfo Guzmán Contest of Cuban Music, making him the only musical author who up to that moment had been selected by the jury with two works.
2001: Nomination in Cubadisco, children's music category with the CD Nanas para ti (Havana).
2001: Nomination in Cubadisco, song category with the CD Corona canta a Corona (Havana).

In 2020 Kiki was selected as responsible for the sound in the visual change of Cubavisión. All the work was done remotely, the people responsible for the new, impressive and tremendous image of the lettering and its additions for Cubavisión; have been made up by a collective of filmmakers presided over by Víctor with his Remache team.