
Guillermo Portabales (born José Guillermo Quesada Castillo,[1] Rodas, Cuba, 6 April 1911 San Juan, Puerto Rico, 25 October 1970) was a Cuban singer-songwriter and guitarist who popularized the guajira style of Cuban music from the 1930s through the 1960s. His languid, melancholy, intensely lyrical guajiras and his elegant, stylish singing made him popular throughout Latin America, where he is still revered. Palmas restaurant. At age 11, Portabales began work as a printer's assistant in Cienfuegos. In 1928, he made his radio debut on the station CMHI, and from then on divided his time between his work as a printer and performing. In the beginning, Portabales sang a variety of styles — canción, tango, bolero, son — until he discovered that his listeners enjoyed the guajira the most. He thereby refined the style and developed his signature salon guajira style in which he depicted in bucolic terms the life of the Cuban guajiro (the rural campesino). In typical trovadore fashion, Portabales sang and played guitar, sometimes accompanied by a small group. His guajiras have a gentle, lilting rhythm, sometimes mixing with elements of the son or the bolero. Portabales continued to perform and perfect the guajira until he went to Puerto Rico in 1937. There he became enamoured of the neighboring island and stayed there for two years, singing in theaters, clubs and on the radio. In 1939, he married Puerto Rican Arah Mina López, a journalist who joined him as he returned to Cuba in <b>...</b>
GUILLERMO
PORTABALES
Promesas
De
Un
Campesino
campo
guajira
son
Cuba
La Habana
latin music
romantic music
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