Celia Cruz

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Cuban-born singing star Celia Cruz (1925 - 2003) has been hailed as the queen of salsa, the queen of rumba, the queen of Latin music, and an inadvertent symbol of the Cuban American community's exile spirit. Cruz, who fled the Caribbean island nation in 1960, became a world-famous singer with an energetic, flamboyant stage presence that brought audiences to their feet. "Cruz is undisputedly the best-known and most influential female figure in the history of Afro-Cuban music," declared "Billboard"'s Leila Cobo.

Sang Lullabies

Though sometimes evasive about her age, it is believed that Cruz was born on October 21, 1925, in Havana, Cuba. Cruz grew up in the Santo Suárez area of Havana in a household headed by her father, a railroad stoker. The family was of Afro-Cuban heritage, descendants of the Africans who were forcibly brought to the island nation to work in its vast sugar fields in centuries past, and eventually grew to include 14 children, some of them Cruz's cousins. As the second eldest child, she would often have to put the younger ones to bed and would sing them to sleep. The adults in the household, hearing her voice, began to gather outside the door to listen themselves.

In her teens, Cruz entered and won first prize in a radio contest, "La hora del té," by singing a tango song. She began entering other amateur contests, and though her mother was encouraging, her father strongly disapproved of her ambitions to become a singer in Cuba's strong salsa scene. This musical style merged elements from traditional Spanish music with the African rhythms that came from the island's former slave population and exemplified national character traits of both exuberance and a penchant for romantic melancholy. Cruz's father hoped instead that she would become a teacher, and so to placate him Cruz entered the local teachers' college for a time, but quit when her singing career began to take off in earnest. From 1947 to 1950 she studied music theory, voice, and piano at the National Conservatory of Music in Havana, but even a teacher there suggested that she pursue stardom full-time.

Fled Castro Regime

Cruz's break came when La Sonora Matancera, a popular Cuban band, hired her as their lead vocalist in 1950. She had a tough time at first, for female singers were a relative rarity in Cuban music - the stage was considered an unseemly place for a woman - and she replaced a singer with a popular following. Irate fans even wrote to the radio station that broadcast La Sonora Matancera performances, but as Cruz told Cobo in Billboard, she was unfazed. "I could care less. This was my job - the job of my dreams and the job that fed me." Even an American record company executive that signed the band was uneasy with the proposition of a rumba track with a female singer, so the band's leader, Rogelio Martínez, promised to pay Cruz out of his own pocket for the session if the record failed to catch on, but the song was a hit.

Both La Sonora Matancera and Cruz became stars in Cuba. Throughout the 1950s, they played regularly at Havana's famed Tropicana nightclub, appeared in films, and toured extensively throughout Latin America. These heady years ended in 1959 when Communist leader Fidel Castro seized power and Cuba became a socialist state. A year and a half later, Cruz was with La Sonora Matancera on a Mexican tour when they defected en masse on July 15, 1960. The band settled in the United States, and Cruz soon became a naturalized citizen. Castro was irate that one of his country's most popular musical acts had made such a public statement against his regime and vowed that none would ever be granted entry back into Cuba again. Cruz tried to return when her mother died in 1962 but was unable to secure government permission. That same year, she wed Pedro Knight, La Sonora Matancera's trumpet player, who would eventually become her manager and musical director for much of her career.

Teamed with Puente

For much of the decade, Cruz remained relatively unknown in the United States outside of the Cuban exile community, but that changed when she joined the Tito Puente Orchestra in the mid-1960s. The popular percussionist and bandleader from Puerto Rico had a large following across Latin America, and as frontperson Cruz again became a dynamic focus for the act. Puente, who died in 2000, once told New York Times writer Elizabeth Llorente, "She keeps the musicians on their toes.… We'll be huffing, exhausted, and she'll be on a roll, with more Tina Turner energy left in her than all of us together."

Cruz recorded several albums with Puente, including Cuba Y Puerto Rico Son in 1966. But it was her stage presence that made her such a compelling figure in Latin music. She had a strong, husky voice that could hold its own against a hard-working rhythm section and was a tireless dancer, storyteller, and audience-rouser. Fans adored her glitzy stage outfits, often sewn from yards of fabric and embellished with sequins, feathers, or lace. Reportedly she never wore the same one twice. High heels and towering wigs only added to the diminutive singer's allure. Her signature shout, "Azucar!" (Sugar!), came from a dining experience at a Miami restaurant, when her Cuban waiter asked if she took sugar in her coffee. As she recalled in the Billboard interview with Cobo, "I said, 'Chico, you're Cuban. How can you even ask that? With sugar!' And that evening during my show - I always talk during the show so the horn players can rest their mouths - I told the audience the story and they laughed. And one day, instead of telling the story, I simply walked down the stairs and shouted 'Azucar!'"

Latin Music's Own Tina Turner

By the 1970s, the salsa sound had caught on with a new generation of Latin Americans, riding a resurgence of ethnic pride and interest in the music of their parents' era. Cruz even appeared at Carnegie Hall for a 1973 staging of Hommy - A Latin Opera, the Spanish-language adaptation of the hit rock opera from the Who's Tommy. For a number of years, she was signed to the Fania label, a salsa-source powerhouse co-owned by trombonist Willie Colón, with whom she recorded an acclaimed 1974 work, Celia and Johnny. She performed regularly with the Fania All-Stars, including a 1976 concert at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx that was recorded and released as a double album. The singer also appeared annually at a New York City salsa-fest held at Madison Square Garden. "Onstage, she leaps, dances, flaunts, flirts and teases to the gyrating beat of salsa," wrote Llorente in a 1987 New York Times article. "She improvises playfully, trading riffs with the chorus and instruments. And just when she seems deeply lost in a song about a doomed love affair - microphone clutched, eyes closed, tears imminent - she looks out at the audience and tosses them an aside ('The man was a jerk, anyway')."

Cruz lived in the New York City area but was also a star in Miami and performed there often. For Cuban Americans, she seemed to symbolize the trajectory of its large exile community centered in southern Florida - many of whom, like her, had fled the Castro regime and then achieved personal and professional success in their adopted homeland. Most were avowed foes of Castro and asserted, as Cruz had also done, that they would never to return to Cuba unless it became a democracy. One song in her repertoire, "Canto a la Habana" (Song to Havana), featured the line, "Cuba que lindos son tus paisajes" (Cuba, what beautiful vistas you have), which would incite an emotional eruption from her audiences. Cruz even gained a following among the second generation of Cuban Americans, noted New York Times writer Mirta Ojito. To those "who left Cuba as children or were born in the United States," Ojito wrote, "Cruz embodied the Cuba of the 1950's, an era that, through the prism of exile and the passing of decades, has become mythic for them."

Won Several Grammys

Over the years, Cruz worked with a roster of performers that proved her crossover appeal, though she never sang in anything but her native Spanish language. She recorded or collaborated with Brazilian star Caetano Veloso, Patti La-Belle, Wyclef Jean of the Fugees, producer Emilio Estefan, the tenor Luciano Pavarotti, and even former Talking Heads singer David Byrne. With him she sang a duet, "Loco de Amor," that appeared on the soundtrack to the 1986 film Something Wild. In the 1992 film The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, she was cast as a nightclub owner, and she also appeared in 1995's The Perez Family. Her awards included a Grammy for best tropical Latin album of 1989 for Ritmo en el corazón, a collaboration with conga player Ray Barretto, and she took three consecutive Latin Grammy awards when the honors were established in 2000, including best salsa album of 2002 for La Negra Tiene Tumbao, which spawned a hit single of the same name.

Cruz was not slowed by age and still toured heavily and recorded well into her seventies. "My life is singing," she told Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service reporter Mario Tarradell in 2002. "I don't plan on retiring. I plan to die on a stage. I can have a headache. But when it's time to sing and I step on that stage, there's no more headache. As long as I'm doing what I want to do, I feel good." Her final album was Regalo de Alma ("Gift from the Soul"), recorded in early 2003 when she was already suffering from cancer. She died on July 16, 2003, at her home in Fort Lee, New Jersey. She had requested that her funeral include two public viewings - one in New York City and a second in Miami. Thousands turned out for each, including a woman dressed as a patron saint in Roman Catholic iconography who stood outside the Madison Avenue funeral home the entire day holding a Cuban flag and a Colombian man who was a regular performer on New York city subway platforms, dancing to Cruz's repertoire with a foam doll.

In Miami, Cruz's casket stood inside a building known as the Freedom Tower, once an immigration-processing center that was the first stop in the United States for some half a million Cuban exiles in the 1960s and 1970s. "For the almost two million Cubans who live outside the island," noted Ojito in the New York Times, "Cruz was an icon.… She embodied what Cubans view as some of their best qualities, strong family ties, an impeccable work ethic and a joy in living, even in the face of calamity." Many of the fans who stood in line for hours in both cities, however, carried the flags of Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Ecuador, and even Jamaica, a testament to Cruz's immense appeal throughout the Latin and Caribbean world.

Books

Contemporary Hispanic Biography, Volume 1, Gale, 2002.

Periodicals

Billboard, October 28, 2000; July 26, 2003.

Economist, July 26, 2003.

Entertainment Weekly, August 1, 2003.

Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service, September 13, 2002; July 16, 2003; July 19, 2003; July 22, 2003.

New York Times, August 30, 1987; July 17, 2003; July 20, 2003; July 22, 2003.

People, August 4, 2003.

Time, July 11, 1998.

Cruz, Celia, 1929-2003, Cuban-American singer, b. Havana. The "Queen of Salsa" began singing as a teenager, and in 1950 joined Sonora Matancera, Cuba's most popular band. She left Cuba a year after Fidel Castro came to power (1960) and was an exile in the United States for the rest of her life. Over the years Cruz sang with nearly every major Latin band, and was particularly noted for her appearances with Tito Puente's orchestra. A fiery performer who wore skintight costumes and billowing blonde wigs, she sang (in Spanish) a range of Afro-Cuban songs, from traditional Santería chants to popular mambos, cha-chas, and the salsa for which she was famous. An international star and an icon to the Cuban-American community, she toured widely, sang in clubs and concert venues, and made more than 70 recordings.

Biography

Beloved as the queen of salsa and seen as an enduring symbol of pre-Castro Cuba by many of that country's exiles, Celia Cruz's had a remarkable six-decade career, with more than 70 records, two Grammy awards, and three Latin Grammys, among numerous other accolades, to her credit. Born into an extended family in the small Havana village of Barrio Santra Suarez, Cruz was drawn to music from an early age, her career sparked when the future superstar earned her first pair of shoes by singing for a generous tourist. Performing in school productions and winning a local radio contest, she was introduced into the world of Cuban music by an aunt who took the young songstress to numerous musical hot spots. Although her father urged her to become a teacher, Cruz was soon winning numerous local singing competitions. Her big break came when she was invited to sing for La Sonora Matancera in 1950, a position she would hold for 15 years. When Fidel Castro came into power in 1959, Cruz immigrated to the United States. Cuban jazz legend Tito Puente helped her form a band for her solo career when the singer left La Sonora Matancera in 1965, and she successfully toured the globe during the '70s after making a mark on the New York Latin jazz scene. Cruz's worldwide popularity peaked with an appearance in the 1992 film The Mambo Kings; her other movies included Affair in Havana (1957), Juegos de Sociedad (1974), and The Perez Family (1995). Cruz won a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Smithsonian Institute in 1994; that same year, the city of Miami named the Cuban community's main street in honor of the enduring songstress. Cruz died of brain cancer in Fort Lee, NJ, in July 2003. She was 77. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

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For The Record...

Born on October 21, 1924; raisedp in the Barrio Santo Suarez, Cuba; came to the United States in 1960, and became a citizen in 1961; married Pedro Knight, trumpeter, 1962; Education: Studied at Havana, Cuba’s National Conservatory of Music, 1947-50. Began singing on Cuban radio in the late 1940’s; in 1950, became the lead singer of Cuban big band, La Sonora Matancera, recording and touring with them until 1965; joined Tito Puente Orchestra in 1966; recorded eight albums with him; sang the role of Gracia Divina at Carnagie Hall in Larry Harlow’s Hommy-A Latin opera, 1973; during the 1980’s and 1990’s performed with such artists as pop singer David Byrne, Emilio Estefan, and Willie Chirino; cameo roles in The Mambo Kings and The Perez Family; has recorded over 50 albums, 20 of which became gold; performed worldwide. Awards: Grammy Award for Best Tropical Latin Album, 1989, awarded medal by President Clinton from the National Endowment of the Arts, 1994. Addresses: Record Company—OmarPardillo-Cid, RMM Records, 568 Broadway, Suite 806, New York, NY 10012; Agent—Bookings Online Talent Agency, Ltd., 236 West 26th St., Ste. 701, New York, NY 10001. Websites—http://www.rmmrecords.com.

Singer

The Queen of Salsa, the Queen of Mambo, the Queen of Latin Music—Celia Cruz reigns as supreme diva. During her illustrious career, Cruz has performed across the globe with other top Latin musicians, recorded more than 50 albums—20 of which went gold, and earned over 100 awards from various countries. The legendary singer with the rich, powerful, contralto voice covering several octaves is known for her incredible ability at improvisation, flamboyant costumes and for sprinkling audiences with sugar during live performances. She has opened doors for other women performers during her career spanning almost fifty years, in a formerly male dominated Latin music world. Although some try to compare her style to jazz greats like Ella Fitzgerald and Sara Vaughan because of her quick staccato interjections of jazz-like scat, Cruz has a unique style, unrivaled by another; she has created her own musical niche.

Salsa sound has been described as Cuban music combined with Puerto Rican and other influences, and behind it all, African religious music. Salsa has a wide range of colorful associations, with an up beat tempo,

and includes a wide range of Latin styles and rhythms. Cruz described salsa for World Music: The Rough Guide, "Salsa is Cuban music with another name. It’s mambo, chachacha, rumba, son…. All the Cuban rhythms under one name." Myth claims that the term "salsa" was created by a Venezuelan radio disc jockey.

Salsa’s roots hail back to the 18th century with the Cuban "son," a rhythm created by Theodora Ginez. It evolved with the influx of Haitians and French to Cuba, and for a while the government officially forbade its playing, saying its lyrics, which protested slavery, encouraged riots. "Son" combined both the African and Spanish roots of Cuban music, with the African percussion and rhythm, the flavor of Spanish guitar, and the style of call and response between one or two male singers. The unifying theme behind it all are the references to a conglomeration of various religions, including Afro-Catholic, incorporating the inconsistencies among them. Through song, the singers hail deities and invoke various goddesses. Although links to deities, goddesses, and saints may be unspoken, many in the audiences understand the connections through the singer’s actions on stage.

Celia Cruz was born on October 21, 1924, and grew up in the Barrio, Santo Suarez, near Havana, Cuba. She was one of four children. As a child she often sang for her family, many times singing her siblings to sleep at night. Later as a teen, she sang in school programs, and soon began entering and winning local radio talent shows. By 1947 she had won her first prize on a radio program, and enrolled in Havana’s National Conservatory of Music, which she attended until 1950. Encouraged by her father, she first dreamt of becoming a teacher. Then a professor at the Conservatory persuaded her she was destined to be a professional singer, and soon Cruz’s first big opportunity would present itself.

Cruz said one of her first influences was a singer, Paulina Alvarez, who was the first singer she ever saw performing in front of an orchestra. Cruz dreamt of performing as Alvarez did, in spite of her different singing style. It was a dream destined to come true. Her big break came when she was chosen to replace the lead singer for the popular Cuban big band, La Sonora Matancera. Beginning in1950, Cruz recorded and toured extensively with the band throughout Latin America and Mexico for the next fifteen years. She and La Sonora came to be known as "Cafe con Leche" ("coffee with milk").

Cruz left Cuba with La Sonora Matancera after the revolution when Fidel Castro came to power, arriving in the United States in 1960. The following year, in 1961, Cruz became a U.S. citizen. Also during 1961, she met Pedro Knight, a trumpet player with the orchestra she was contracted to perform with at Hollywood, California’s Palladium. In 1962 she married Knight, who in 1965 put his own career aside to manage his wife’s career. During the 1920s and 1930s the salsa style had regained popularity with various bands continuing innovations to el son. Perez Prado’s 1949 hit, "Mambo #5," officially kicked off the mambo era.

Performed with Many Salsa Innovators
Tito Puente was among those who adapted Prado’s sound for audiences and the dance crowds of New York during the 1950s. In 1966 Cruz joined Tito Puente’s Orchestra and recorded eight albums with him on Tico Records. Cruz maintained her alliance with Puente into the 1990s, performing in Europe with him. Puente is known as the King of Latin Music.

In 1973 Cruz sang at Carnagie Hall in the role of Gracia Divina in Larry Harlow’s Hommy-A Latin opera, an adaption of the rock opera, Tommy, by the Who. It was during this time that salsa music was revitalized in the United States. Throughout the 1970’s Cruz performed with many others including Johnny Pacheco, Willie Colon, and the Fania All-Stars. The All-Stars included other salsa notables such as Bobby Cruz, Ricardo Ray, Ismael Quintana, Larry Harlow, Ray Barretto, and many more. During this time as a featured singer with the Fania All-Stars she toured worldwide with the group including spots in London, England, Cannes, France, and Zaire, Africa.

Willie Colon, singer and trombonist, was responsible for much innovation in salsa in New York, as was Johnny Pacheco, musician and producer who directed Fania Records. Cruz and Pacheco made the album, Celia and Johnny, which went gold. She and Pacheco would team up and produce two more hit albums. Soon this style was copied in Latin America, and the Caribbean, but New York maintained its position as the creative and evolutionary center of the Latin music world.

Gained Worldwide Recognition
During the 1980s and 1990s Cruz performed with a wide range of talent, including David Byrne, Emilio Estefan, and Willie Chirino. She has appeared in cameo roles in The Perez Family and The Mambo Kings; exposure in both films gained herthe attention of a greater non-Latin audience. Although Cruz is one of the few Latin singers with an extensive audience in the U.S., language barriers interfere with breakthrough onto pop charts in the United States. Unlike many European countries where people speak several languages, and American music is played alongside the music of that country, salsa may get limited air time in the United States because it isn’t in English.

Cruz has been recognized in countries worldwide by various institutions, newspapers, and magazines. Some of her awards include an honorary doctorate degree from Yale University, a star on Hollywood Boulevard in California, a Grammy Award in 1989 for Best Tropical Latin Album, plus many Grammy nominations over the years. She received a medal from President Clinton in 1994 from the National Endowment of the Arts. Cruz is included in Walks of Fame in Costa Rica, Venezuela, and Mexico. She has earned many other awards during her career, over 100 total.

She continues recording and performing live, showing no signs of slowing down. Cruz tours about ten months out of each year. "Azúcar" is her calling card, and she is known for her ability at improvisation as well as her talent to bring a sense of euphoria through her music to her audience. Peter Watrous of the New York Times, described her voice during a 1995 performance: "Her voice sounded, as if it were made of cast iron, durable and pure. "Ina later review, of a performance in November 1996 at the Blue Note, Greenwich Village, New York, which Watrous also covered for the New York Times, he noted Cruz’s use of "rich, metaphorical language." He added, "This was virtuosity that is rarely heard, where a combination of languages, cultures, and epoches all added up to a deep intelligence, a Creole vision of the New World’s promise."

In spite of her monumental success, reigning as supreme diva over Latin music for over 40 years, one of Cruz’s fondest desires has nothing to do with music. She told Beat interviewer, Derek Rath, she would welcome the opportunity to return to Cuba, to visit her mother’s grave. Cruz’s greatest rewards come from her ability to bring others happiness through her music. She told Rath, "When I sing I put everything I have inside me into it, a lot of love. Music is the only gift I have that was given to me by God…. [it] is my purpose in life…. I want people to feel their hearts sing and their spirits soar."

Selected discography
The Winners, Vaya, 1987.
Best, Sony/Globo, 1992, originally issued on Fania Records.
Best Vol. 2, Sony Discos/Globo, 1994.
Canciones Premiadas, Palladium, 1994.
Irrepetible, UNI/RMM, 1994.
La Tierna Conmovedora Bambolea, Palladium, 1994.
Homenaje a Los Santos, Polydor, 1994.
Cuba’s Queen of Rhythm, Palladium, 1995.
Canta Celia Cruz, Palladium, 1995.
Irresistible, Sony Discos/Orfeón, 1995.
Azúcar Negra, UNI/RMM, 1998.
Su Favorita Celia Cruz, Secco.
Reflexiones De Celia Cruz, Secco.
Bravo Celia Cruz, Tico.

With Tito Puente
Cuba Y Puerto Rico Son, Tico.
El Quimbo Quimbumbia, Tico.
Alma Con Alma, Tico.
Algo Especial Para Recordar, Tico.
Homenaje A Beny More, Vaya.


With La Sonora Matancera
100% Azúcar: The Best of Celia, Rhino Records, 1997.
Cuba’s Foremost Rhythm Singer with Sonora Matancera, Secco.
Con Amor: Celia Cruz with La Sonora Matancera, Secco.
La Incomparable Celia and Sonora Matancera, Secco.
Feliz Encuentro, Barbaro.
Nostalgia Tropical, Orfeón.

With Others
Duets, UNI/RMM, 1997.
Fania All-Stars, Sony Discos, 1997.
Celia and Johnny, Vaya.
Celia and Willie Colon, Vaya.

Sources
Books
Broughton, Simon, Mark Ellingham, David Muddyman, and Richard Trillo, editors, World Music: The Rough Guide, Rough Guides, 1994.
Erlewine, Michael, Chris Woodstra, and Vladimir Bogdanov, editors, All-Music Guide, Miller Freeman Books, 1994.
Slonimsky, Nicolas, editor, Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, Schirmer Books, 1992.

Periodicals
Beat, #6, 1995, p. 42-45.
Interview, November 1996.
Metro Times (Detroit, Ml), November 5-11, 1997, p. 50.
Mirabella, June 1994.
New York Times, July 4, 1995, p. 26; November 23, 1996, p. 14; (magazine) November 1, 1992.
Stereo Review, January 1995, p. 8.

Online
http://www.cduniverse.com/
http://www.rmmrecords.com/
Additional information was provided by publicist, Omar Pardillo-Cid of RMM Records.

• Genres: Latin

Biography

Celia Cruz was one of Latin music's most respected vocalists. A ten-time Grammy nominee, Cruz, who sang only in her native Spanish language, received a Smithsonian Lifetime Achievement award, a National Medal of the Arts, and honorary doctorates from Yale University and the University of Miami. A street in Miami was even renamed in her honor, and Cruz's trademark orange, red, and white polka dot dress and shoes have been placed in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institute of Technology. The Hollywood Wax Museum includes a statue of the Cuba-born songstress. According to the European Jazz Network, Cruz "commands her realm with a down-to-earth dignity unmistakably vibrant in her wide smile and striking pose."

One of 14 children, born in the small village of Barrio Santos Suarez, Havana, Cruz was drawn to music from an early age. Her first pair of shoes was a gift from a tourist for whom she sang. In addition to spending many evenings singing her younger siblings to sleep, Cruz sang in school productions and community gatherings. Taken to cabarets and nightclubs by an aunt, she was introduced to the world of professional music. At the encouragement of a cousin, Cruz began to enter and win local talent shows. Although her father attempted to guide her toward a career as a teacher, Cruz continued to be lured by music. In a 1997 interview, she said, "I have fulfilled my father's wish to be a teacher as, through my music, I teach generations of people about my culture and the happiness that is found in just living life. As a performer, I want people to feel their hearts sing and their spirits soar." Enrolling in Cuba's Conservatory of Music in 1947, Cruz found her earliest inspiration in the singing of Afro-Cuban vocalist Paulina Alvarez. Her first break came when she was invited to join the band la Sonora Matancera in 1950. The group was revered as the Latin equivalent of the Duke Ellington Orchestra. Cruz remained with the group for 15 years, touring throughout the world. She married the band's trumpet player Pedro Knight on July 14, 1962. With Fidel Castro's assuming control of Cuba in 1960, Cruz and Knight refused to return to their homeland and became citizens of the United States. Although they initially signed to perform with the orchestra of the Hollywood Palladium, Cruz and Knight eventually settled in New York. Knight became Cruz's manager in 1965, a position he held until the mid-'90s when he began to devote his attention to serving as her musical director and conductor of her band.

Leaving Sonora Matancera's band in 1965, Cruz launched her solo career with a band formed for her by Tito Puente. Despite releasing eight albums together, the collaboration failed to achieve commercial success. Cruz and Puente resumed their partnership with a special appearance at the Grammy Award ceremonies in 1987. Signed by Vaya, the sister label of Fania, Cruz recorded with Oscar D'Leon, Cheo Feliciano, and Hector Rodriquez in the mid- to late '60s. Cruz's first success since leaving Sonora Matancera came in 1974 when she recorded a duo album, Celia and Johnny, with Johnny Pacheco, trombone player and the co-owner of Fania. She subsequently began appearing with the Fania All Stars. Cruz's popularity reached its highest level when she appeared in the 1992 film The Mambo Kings. Cruz also appeared in the film The Perez Family. She sang a duet version of "Loco de Amor," with David Byrne, in the Jonathan Demme movie Something Wild. In 1998, Cruz released Duets, an album featuring her singing with Willie Colon, Angela Carrasco, Oscar D'Leon, Jose Alberto "El Canario," and la India. Cruz continued to record and perform until sidelined by a brain tumor in 2002. While recovering from surgery to remove the tumor, she managed to make it in to the studio in early 2003 to record Regalo de Alma. Her surgery was only partially successful and she died July 16, 2003. The passing of the "Queen of Salsa" left a huge gap in Latin music, but also a remarkable catalog to document her reign. ~ Craig Harris, Rovi

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