Leonardo José Acosta Sánchez

Leonardo José Acosta Sánchez was born in the Cerro neighborhood, Tulipán Street and Calzada del Cerro, in the house where the "Paulita Concepción" school is currently located. He completed his primary and secondary studies in his native city. In 1950 he began studying architecture at the University of Havana and studied for two years until 1954 when the University was closed.

He studied Solfège and Music Theory, and Musical Appreciation with professors Sara Rodríguez-Baz and Gisela Hernández, respectively. He later received instrumental lessons in trumpet and saxophone, as well as harmony, with professors such as José R. Betancourt and Julián Orbón.

His musical training was intensive; he studied solfège and theory with Sara Rodríguez Baz, and musical appreciation with Gisela Hernández; trumpet with Pedro Mercado; saxophone with José Raphel, and completed his training on this instrument with José Pérez, solo saxophonist of Adolfo Guzmán's orchestra, who also taught him harmony classes; tenor saxophone was placed in his hands by José Ramón Betancourt. He took courses in harmony, instrumentation, orchestration, counterpoint, musical forms, and composition from Leo Brouwer and Federico Smith. With Frank Emilio he learned how to apply harmony to jazz improvisation.

During the early years of the 1950s he worked in important popular music orchestras in Cuba, the United States, and Venezuela, with jazz groups and singers of the "feeling" movement, among which we can mention: Havana Melody, Cubamar, Julio Gutiérrez, Rafael Somavilla, Benny Moré, Aldemaro Romero, Armando Roméu, José Antonio Méndez, Frank Emilio, Rosendo Ruiz Jr., El Niño Rivera, Chucho Valdés, Carlos Emilio Morales, and others.

He worked as a saxophonist from 1949 to 1958 with the orchestras Havana Melody, Cubamar, Riverside, Julio Gutiérrez, in which he was substitute for tenor saxophonists Lito Rivero and Emilio Peñalver; Benny Moré, Rey Díaz Calvet, in which he played first alto saxophone and clarinet and premiered the Capri Hotel cabaret; Armando Romeu, as substitute for Roberto Sánchez Ferrer; with that of Aldemaro Romero, Venezuela, 1956, and that of Rafael Somavilla in the Bambú cabaret. He also performed with groups such as Loquibambia on alto saxophone, alongside Frank Emilio, José Antonio Méndez, Rosendo Ruiz Quevedo...; Teddy Corabi's jazz quintet, an American pianist, and with his own groups, among them the Hot Rockers, a rock and roll group, 1957, with Tony Escarpenter as singer, with which he toured Venezuela.

Later he joined another group that had as members Raúl Ondina, piano; Pablo Cano, guitar; Orlando López (Cachaíto), bass, and Armando Zequeira, drums; he also organized a group with Pedro Chao, tenor saxophone; Alberto Giral (El Men); Cachaíto, bass; Zequeira, drums, and Acosta himself, alto saxophone.

With a jazz quartet made up of Frank Emilio, piano; Papito Hernández, bass; Walfredo de los Reyes, drums, and Leonardo Acosta, alto saxophone, he inaugurated the Cuban Jazz Club (1958), organized by a group of musicians and jazz enthusiasts. By American invinist; Vinnie Tanno, trumpet player; Philley Joe Jones, drummer, and Zoot Sims, tenor saxophonist, among others.

In 1958 he performed with multi-instrumentalist Eddie Shu, with members of Sarah Vaughan's trio: pianist Jimmy Jones, bassist Richard Davis, and drummer Roy Haynes; with Mexican jazz musicians such as Chilo Morán and José Solís, trumpet players; Mario Patrón, pianist; Richard Lemus, drummer; Cuco Valtierra, Héctor Hallal (El Árabe) and Tommy Rodríguez, saxophonists.

With Teddy Corabi's quartet he performed at the St. John's hotel, playing alto saxophone; the other members were: Alejandro Vivar, trumpet; Luis Rodríguez, bass, and Walfredo de los Reyes, drums. Elena Burke and Frank Domínguez performed with this quartet.

With the triumph of the Revolution in 1959, he was a founder of the Prensa Latina news agency, where he worked as a correspondent in Mexico and Czechoslovakia, while also covering information in other European countries. He worked at that agency until 1968.

In 1969 he returned to music as a member of the Sound Experimentation Group (GES) of the ICAIC, together with Sergio Vitier, Pablo Milanés, Silvio Rodríguez, Eduardo Ramos, Noel Nicola, Emiliano Salvador and Leoginaldo Pimentel, who directed by Leo Brouwer, conducted numerous compositions and recordings for Cuban cinema. There he received classes in orchestration, composition, among others, from Federico Smith and Leo Brouwer. He remained in the GES until 1972.

In the 1970s he composed the score for the ICAIC film Missing Prisoners, a Cuban-Chilean co-production, directed by Sergio Castilla; and for documentaries by Sergio Giral, Sara Gómez and others; participated, as a founder, of the Sound Experimentation Group (1969-1972); performed as a soloist, alto saxophone, in the work Erotofonías by Juan Blanco (the other soloist was Leo Brouwer on guitar), and in Exaedros by Leo Brouwer, in which he played the recorder flute, directed by Hans Werner Henze, at its world premiere in Cuba.

He also performed as a soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by maestro Manuel Duchesne Cuzán, in works by Leo Brouwer, Sergio Vitier, Roberto Valera and Hans Werner Henze, while collaborating in numerous publications already mentioned.

Later he worked as an editor of the magazine Revolución y Cultura.
He wrote different articles, among which we can mention: "Africa and Music of the New World"; "Eternal Youth of Our Popular Music"; "Machito: Father of Latin Jazz and Salsa"; among others. He has also published numerous books, mostly essays, and has been co-author of others.

From 1978 to 1989 he was a musical advisor to Cuban Television. Between 1989 and 1993, the year he retired, he was a literary advisor to the ICL.

He has also given lectures in Cuba, Venezuela, Colombia, the United States, Mexico, and Spain.

Awards granted: 2004. "Félix Varela" Order - 2003. "Alejo Carpentier" Medal - 2006. National Literature Prize

Notable work: Cuban Descarga: Jazz in Cuba 1900-1950

With a vast conceptual apparatus that he handles with unparalleled mastery, he has addressed the most pressing issues of third world music in Music and Decolonization; the history, practice, and personalities of Cuban music in From Drum to Synthesizer and You Choose What I Sing, or the history of jazz in our environment and its relationship with this artistic manifestation in the United States in Cuban Descarga: Jazz in Cuba 1900-1950.

Leonardo Acosta faces these issues with singular lucidity, erudition, and boldness. His originality in interpreting these topics is supported by his solid theoretical training, which leads him to inquiries that are rare in this type of study in our environment. As he seeks answers that are rarely, or almost never, found within the framework of music history, he turns to sociology, literature, general history, philosophy, economics, psychology, and anthropology to demonstrate, once again, the importance of interdisciplinary studies in musical analysis.

In 2007 he received the National Literature Prize.

He has published literary and musical essays: From Drum to Synthesizer, Music and Decolonization, Cuban Jazz Descarga, Another Vision of Cuban Popular Music.

Acosta's musicological works are of enormous scope, very linked to the affairs of common people, working-class people. He is not concerned with the complicated matters of semiotics, Eurocentric concepts; he goes to the themes that have to do with his pious. He does this from the perspective of his experiences as a musician, journalist, researcher, and connoisseur of Cuban artists.

Leonardo's latest book Another Vision of Cuban Popular Music is a highly debated book, with very bold viewpoints that help us meditate, to reflect on the problems of Cuban musical genres, on the initiators and established figures of music.

Music and Decolonization continues to be a required reading book, both for its concepts and for the bibliography consulted. Leonardo is a very thorough researcher, well-informed about the latest in music and knows how to direct it in his research. The problem of colonization is an issue that has pursued us for more than 500 years, a sword that American countries must remove from their shoulders. Congratulations to Leonardo Acosta, to our great friend and musicologist of the end of the millennium years and beyond.