Cuban Salsa Singer Beny More

Many fans of Afro-Cuban music consider the late Beny Moré the greatest salsa singer ever.

Beny was born Bartholomé Moré, the oldest of 18 children in the central Cuban town of Santa Isabel de las Lajas. From his early years, he had an uncanny sense of musical style and distinctive voice. Beny's vocal expressiveness and phrasing gave rise to his popularity. He sang all types of Cuban music, including son montuno, guaracha, guajira, cha cha cha, Afro-Cuban, guaguanco and bolero.

His maternal great-great grandfather, Ta Ramón Gundo Paredes, was said to be the son of the king of a tribe in the Congo. Family history was that he was captured by slave traders and sold to a Cuban plantation owner. He was finally freed and died in Cuba at the age of 64.

Beny was a self-taught guitarist by creating his instrument from a board and ball of string. After working in the Cuban sugar cane fields, he was able to purchase his first guitar. He made money by playing in bars and clubs, finally earning a break on a Cuban radio show. Eventually he was asked to join the famous group, Trio Matamoros and played at two of the biggest nightclubs in Mexico: the Montparnasse and the Rio Rosa. It was around this time that he changed his name to Beny Moré.

Having achieved stardom in Mexico, Brazil, Panama, Colombia and Puerto Rico, Beny returned to Cuba at the end of 1950; however, he returned a virtual unknown.

Beny recorded with the group Orquesta Aragón in 1952, performing live gigs in the dance halls of Havana. The Orquesta encountered trouble with bookings, with which Moré assisted.

When Beny discovered he was losing some gigs because he was black, he was furious. He contacted RCA Records' agent in Cuba and advised he would no longer record with with the Orquesta Aragón.  Beny organized his own orchestra.

The first performance of Moré's Banda Gigante (literally Giant Band, or Gigantic Band) was in the program Cascabeles Candado of the station CMQ. The Banda was comprised of up to forty musicians, comparable in size with Xavier Cugat's big band.   Although not able to read music, Moré arranged material by singing the parts to his musicians.

Over the mid to late 1950s, the Banda Gigante rose in popularity, touring Venezuela, Jamaica, Haiti, Colombia, Panama, Mexico and the U.S., where the group played at the Oscar ceremonies.

In the aftermath of the Cuban Revolution, many of Cuba's great musicians left; either the US or Mexico.  The Charanga bands went to Miami and everyone else went to NYC, but Beny, the greatest of them all, stayed in Cuba, among as he said, "mi gente" - "my people".

When Beny died in 1963 of cirrhosis of the liver, an estimated 100,000 fans attended his funeral. He was only 43 years old.

His memory is honored in Cuba in September of every year by a festival in Cienfuegos that bears his name. Many Cuban singers refer to him in their songs.

Compay Segundo (Buena Vista Social Club) who knew Moré during the 1940s, described the man behind the music. "He was very tall and very black, he always wore a hat with a huge brim and he carried a cane," the veteran singer answered, "he was a showman and he was the greatest of them all. No one else came near."