Gonzalo Arsenio

From the age of fifteen he created unsurpassable guaguancós, among which "Me regaña el corazón" and "Los cubanos son rareza", "Chango vá vení", "Una chambelona", "Donde están los cubanos", "Consuélate como yo", "Mal de yerba", "Tierra brava", "Este es mi país", "Rumbearemos y cantaremos", "Bombón", "Se ha vuelto mi corazón un violín" and others have gained popularity.

He combined the beauty and quality of his lyrics with surprising melodic and rhythmic imagination. He was a self-taught musician phenomenon with enormous facility for improvisation.

Known as Tío Tom. He began singing, playing and dancing rumba at parties and gatherings in his neighborhood of Cayo Hueso, in Atarés, and in other Havana neighborhoods. He sang about current political and social events, about love, about friendship, about the urban world.

He composed a large but undetermined number of rumbas that he never recorded or if he did, only partially and in recent years, supported by a small group of connoisseurs of his work. He was the author of songs that many believe are anonymous, such as Me regaña el corazón, Rumbearemos y cantaremos or, to take a closer example, this classic whose lyrics today preside over our section and which I have taken from the voice of Carlos Embales.

Consuélate como yo
Gonzalo Arsenio, Tío Tom

Comfort yourself like I do
that I also had a love
and I lost it.
And that's why I say now
I will never love again,
what good did love do you
if love betrayed you
like it did me?

That's why now
I will never love again
I will never love again
I don't love you anymore.