Alberto Villalón Morales (7 June 1882 in

Santiago de Cuba Santiago de Cuba is the second-largest city in Cuba and the capital city of Santiago de Cuba Province. It lies in the southeastern area of the island, some southeast of the Cuban capital of Havana. The municipality extends over , and contains t ...

– 16 July 1955 in

Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.trova ''Trova'' is a style of Music of Cuba, Cuban popular music originating in the 19th century. Trova was created by itinerant musicians known as ''trovadores'' who travelled around Cuba's Oriente Province, Oriente province, especially Santiago de Cu ...

style. He was the only one of the 'four greats' of the trova to come from a well-to-do family. Villalón and his sister América studied guitar with Pepe Sánchez, the father of the trova movement. Later, he studied classical guitar to achieve a really excellent technique. He composed his first canciones and boleros at fourteen, and moved to Havana in 1900. In 1907 he recorded on ''Edison'' cylinders. In 1908 he formed the Cuarteto Villalón with Adolfo Colombo (tenor), Claudio García (baritone), Emilio Reinoso (mandolin), and Alberto Villalón (guitar). Colombo and García were regular members of the ''Teatro Alhambra'' company; Colombo was the most recorded singer of the age.Díaz Ayala, Cristóbal 1994. ''Cuba canta y baila: discografía de la música cubana 1898–1925''. p193 et seq. A difference between Villalón and the other early trovadors was in his guitar technique. With his training he preferred picking (punteado) instead of strumming (rasgueado), which had been the main technique previously. This gave him a wider range of harmonic possibilities and a characteristic style. He had a second career in 1927 when he became a founding member of the Septeto Nacional de

Ignacio Piñeiro Ignacio Piñeiro Martínez (May 21, 1888 – March 12, 1969) was a Cuban musician, bandleader and composer whose career started in rumba and flowered in the rise of the son. He was one of the most important composers of son music; in total h ...

. Alberto brought into the septet Juan de la Cruz and Benvenido León, who had been playing with him in a trio. The addition of the first really great sonero, Abelardo Barroso (1905 – 1972), made the Nacional the best group in Cuba for its time. Villalón's career, then, connected the world of trova with the world of son which became central to Cuba's popular music for the rest of the century.

References

*Hermanas Martí: ''Música de Alberto Villalón''. EGREM LDA–3189

External links

Alberto Villalón Morales recordings
at the

Discography of American Historical Recordings The Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR) is a database catalog of master recordings made by American record companies during the 78rpm era. The 78rpm era was the time period in which any flat disc records were being played at ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Villalon, Alberto 1882 births 1955 deaths Cuban male singer-songwriters Cuban singer-songwriters Cuban guitarists Cuban male guitarists Musicians from Santiago de Cuba Musicians from Havana 20th-century Cuban male singers 20th-century Cuban guitarists