Beny More

• Genre: Mambo
• Hometown: Havana

About

One of the most loved and influential singers in the history of the Spanish language, Beny More has attained the status of saint in his Cuban homeland. Possessed of a naturally pure tenor voice, he established himself as a singer in the 1940s with groups led by legendary figures Miguel Matamoros and Perez Prado in Mexico City. Later, he returned to Havana with his own large orchestra that featured a big, brash horn section and Cuban percussion he conducted with gregarious flare. Equally adept at singing either the slow Bolero or an up-tempo Mambo and son guajiro, he always cut a dapper figure in his zoot suits, large white hat, and black cane. Although musically uneducated, he demonstrated sophisticated techniques such as his trademark vocal sustain that slid up or down the scale as smoothly as rum flowed in the clubs of pre-revolutionary Cuba. Much like his famous song "Bonito y Sabroso," his music remains both beautiful and evocative of a different era.

- Robert Leaver