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Renowned Cuban Drummer Laid To Rest

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 6, 2008

GUINES, Cuba - Cuban musicians, family and friends remembered the island's most famous conga drummer, Tata Guines, as he was buried outside Havana on Tuesday after a six-decade career that helped to popularize Afro-Cuban rhythms worldwide.

Known as the "King of the Congas" and "Golden Hands," Guines died Monday after being hospitalized for hypertension and kidney problems. He was 77.

"There's no one in Cuba, if not the world, better at making percussion an art," Cuban music critic Jose Luis Estrada wrote Tuesday in the state-run newspaper Juventud Rebelde.
Guines won a Latin Grammy in 2004 for "Lagrimas Negras," or "Black Tears," a collaboration with legendary exiled Cuban jazz pianist Bebo Valdes and Spanish singer Diego La Cigala. He also worked with the Rumba Cubana All-Stars on "La Rumba Soy Yo," or "I Am the Rumba," which won a Latin Grammy in 2001.

He received Cuba's National Music Award in 2006.

The Associated Press

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