Gilberto Aldanás Gutiérrez

Aldanás's vocation began with his mother, Gloria Gutiérrez Gutiérrez, who sang and raised all six siblings by singing to them. Later, he sang in a children's company founded by the Aguiar sisters.

But his professional debut was in Varadero, with the Trío Pichardo, on March 8, 1941, since its director, Sergio, knew him from his performances, since age 12, in a duet with Frank Domínguez on piano and Aldanás as vocalist. Sergio Pichardo taught him to play the maracas and over the years he studied music, but his favorite instrument has been his voice.

In Matanzas at that time there was a great cultural atmosphere in which four famous Cuban figures already stood out: Frank Domínguez, Felipe Dulzaides, Rafael Somavilla Pedroso and Ñico Rojas. The four of them left for La Habana after graduating from high school, while Gilberto, in 1946, came and went, until he settled in the capital, definitively, in 1948.

The first job he did was not singing, but carrying... sacks... at the Wordline docks. Already in La Habana he joins several groups like the Faxas quartet, which he has to alternate with work as a teacher.

Throughout his long life he demonstrated his spirit of justice in addition to his artistic spirit. Because of that need for justice he conspired against Batista, being detained and tortured although he was later released. However, he had to pay the price of his correct conduct, as he was forced to resign from his work as a teacher.

During that time he sang in an emblematic orchestra, Conjunto Sonora Matancera, after speaking with the director, Rogelio Martínez, a classmate of his father. The arranger, Severino Ramos, tested him and accepted him. With them he recorded two boleros by Humberto Jauma, a composer who was with the founders of feeling, the two boleros by Jauma were recorded with Sonora Matancera and within 15 days they made it to La Pizarra Roja. Aldanás was later with Los Llopis Dulzaides.

When television was founded he debuted in the Phillips Album Program on Channel 6, accompanied on piano by professor Adolfo Guzmán. And he started with two songs by César Portillo de la Luz: Contigo en la distancia and Tú, mi delirio.

Also as a member of a quartet he was hired for Fiesta del Cha, Cha, Chá, Festival RCA and Musical Dominical. Accompanying singers such as Olga Guillot, Fernando Albuerne Garcell, among others. In those days Julio Gutiérrez, musical director of Channel 4, wanted to form a male quartet and Aldanás started with Carlos Faxas's, which emerged in 1951, with César Más, Orlando Noriega, Orlando Morales and him.

When word spread that he secretly recorded, on February 15, 1957, the Himno del 26 de Julio, by Moncadista Agustín Díaz Cartaya, the other singers were Manón D'Asper, Enrique Herrera and Sonia de Aragón, accompanied by Carlos Faxas on piano and four other musicians, and assisted by two audio technicians. It was done in a Radio Cadena Habana studio, a station then located in the lower floors of the Centro Gallego, the businessmen did not want to hire him; it became impossible for him to perform in Cuba and he had to go with the quartet to Venezuela.

As Carlos Faxas was arrested, accused of participating in sabotage at the Rancho Boyeros Agricultural Fair, and they thought it had been because of the hymn recording, almost everyone broke the acetate record, except Manón and Aldanás.

Faxas, when he was released, went into exile to the United States. Aldanás remained in charge of the quartet and sent Faxas the only two records in his possession, to save them. He was out of Cuba on January 1, 1959 and upon returning, on the 9th, he sees Carlos Faxas, who had been appointed general secretary of musicians and could not continue in the quartet.

Gilberto Aldanás and Fernando Mulens as artistic director were in charge of maintaining the vocal group, but changing its name to Los Modernistas, with two new singers: Miguel de la Uz and Yolanda Brito. With that quartet he was from 1959 until 1975, when he left for Angola on an international military mission.

He is a founder of the National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC) and of Cuban Television, he holds the Distinction For National Culture, La Giraldilla de La Habana, the Gitana Tropical and Amadeo Roldán of UNEAC, among other recognitions.