Francisco Leonel Amat Rodríguez

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Amat (Güira de Melena, La Habana, 1950) possesses an extensive musical career that has been enriched by his time with groups such as Manguaré, the orchestra Adalberto Álvarez y su son, and his most recent project, the Cabildo del son.

Amat is one of those artists who knows he is going to be a musician no matter what, which is why he would enlist in any party or jam session that came up in the neighborhood. In musical bands, vocal groups, rock festivals, congas and rumbas.

His father was a charcoal seller, and one day one of his customers didn't have a way to pay him for a sack of charcoal and gave him instead an old, ramshackle guitar that was nothing more than an invented tres. The charcoal seller assumed that this would be the best gift for his son Panchito.

Then Panchito sought the support of a tres player named Herminio Pérez and a fellow called Lucumí, from a son group. Everything was done in a somewhat empirical way.

Truly, Pancho Amat began studying professionally at the Pedagógico of Ciudad Libertad and in 1971 graduated as a professor of Chemistry and Physics. In those days the Chilean group Quilapayún visited Cuba, and the Union of Communist Youth and the Department of Culture took the initiative to create the group Manguaré, in the style of highland groups with barricade music.

Amat was selected to play guitar, cuatro, tiple, and charango. The group was advised by Frank Fernández. He remained with Manguaré from 1971 to 1988, and during that time he was called "Pancho Manguaré".

Thus he acquired development, and under the guidance of professor and pianist Frank Fernández, he began to make musical arrangements. He researched highland music and began studies at the Ignacio Cervantes School of Professional Development supported by teachers Juan Elósegui and Rafael Lay; but it was guitarist Martín Rojas who suggested to Pancho that he dedicate himself entirely to the tres because of the importance of those instrumentalists within the traditions of son folklore.

It was from then on that he began to conduct his own research on the most renowned tres players: el Niño Rivera, Neneíto, Luis Lija Ortiz, Isaac Oviedo, José Antonio Castañeda, Felito Molina, Alfredo Boloña, Panchito Chevrolet, Hilario Ariza, Eliseo Silveira, Nené Manfugás, the Wilson brothers, Chito Latamblé, Arsenio Rodríguez, Liviano.

He also studied the possibilities of the lute and all of them gave him special knowledge. He puts great emphasis on harmony and tries to learn the secrets of the tres; it has helped him greatly to have played the bongos and percussion instruments in street congas in his youth. He does not discriminate between el Niño Rivera and Paul McCartney. "My concept, my sound consists of improvising the son and sonifying the ballad."

He has been creating what we could call fields of collaboration with many musicians, groups and cultural entities: Since 1972 he was linked to the direction of the New Song Movement; he participated with Silvio Rodríguez on his album Días y Flores; he worked on concerts and albums by Pablo Milanés, Vicente Feliú, Sara González, Miriam Ramos, Alina Orraca, José María Vitier, Noel Nicola, Cuní and Chapottín. With Adalberto Alvarez he did some tres "solos" in recordings of the Conjunto Son 14 and from 1987-1995 he remained with the group Adalberto y su Son.

He has worked with Papo Lucca, Sabina, Cesaria Evora, Oscar D'León, Ry Cooder, The Chieftain, Yomo Toro, John Pearson, Mongo Santamaría, Andy Montañez, Giovanni Hidalgo, Alfredo de la Fe, Víctor Jara. He has a valuable participation alongside Leo Brouwer, with the tres, at the Havana Guitar Festivals between 1984 and 1986.

After the separation of Adalberto y su Son, Pancho worked with Juan Perro on a rock-montuno project in Spain. He also performed with "Cubanismo" and played with the duo Las Hermanas Fáez, from Santiago de Cuba.

Since 2000, Amat has had his ensemble El Cabildo del Son, with which he has traveled to many countries and recorded several albums. He has a gathering space at the National Museum of Music and is part of the Café Vista Alegre project, a work that he hopes will bear good fruit internationally.

Pancho Amat has taken the tres to the best stages in Europe, the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean.

He is also a composer: Llegó el tresero; En el café; Masa limpia; Para hacerte un regalo; Un bongosero en Nueva Orleans; Después que probaste qué; Un son para mi abuelo; Por un camino seguro.

He has music for documentaries and television stories. He has done productions for David Alvarez, Aliamén, Gina León, Sara González. Pancho has done almost everything in music and the tres.

According to Adalberto Alvarez: "Pancho Amat is the best tres player in Cuba," and according to musicologist Danilo Orozco: "Pancho has come to represent the realm of the Cuban tres, possesses excellent sound and a balanced combination of styles, in his faculty as a stellar improviser."

Graduate of the Ignacio Cervantes School of Professional Development, he has always been a student of his instrument. His vocation as a teacher has made him an important collaborator in the development program for artistic education, especially of the tres, sponsored by the Cuban Institute of Music.

Several of Pancho Amat's recordings have been awarded at the International Cubadisco Fair, as happened in the 2010 edition with Mis raíces (Bis Music 2010), an album he made with singer María Victoria Rodríguez that won the grand prize of the event.

Amat «has managed to achieve a very high level as a performer and as a creator of a new direction in an instrument that is popular». He has elevated the tres as a concert instrument through the linking of concepts from classical music, jazz and ballad styles and is a continuator in Cuba of the work of celebrated tres players such as Arsenio Rodríguez. He is a graduate in classical guitar from the Ignacio Cervantes conservatory.

He has worked with numerous formats of Cuban music such as trios or quartets, typical ensembles, charangas, even doing arrangements for symphony orchestra.

In 1995 he releases Son Por Tres, an album that wins the National Critics Prize at Cubadisco. He works with Spanish rocker Santiago Auserón on the Juan Perro project, fusing the tres with rock.

In De San Antonio a Maisí, his second production, he combines different styles of Cuban music such as son and bolero working with his group El Cabildo del Son. This album was awarded the Best Traditional Music Album prize at Cubadisco 2002.