Desi Arnaz

Most people know Desi Arnaz as the adorable and temperamental Ricky Ricardo, Lucille Ball’s husband during the fifties (in real life and on the screen) in one of the most successful television series of all times, "I love Lucy". Inside the industry, he is known as the force behind Desiu Productions.

However, before being an international star, he was known as a musician, not as an actor or as a businessman. Arnaz could have done more to make the conga more popular in the U.S., more than any other figure, directing an orchestra that combined Latino-Cuban music with big band sounds and making it available to the masses with his melodramatic voice. He attracted less attention than the more ambitious Xavier Cugat, but his recordings contain a surprising amount of Latin passion.

Born in Santiago de Cuba, Arnaz moved to Miami as an adolescent and began working as a conga singer and guitarist. He was an apprentice with Xavier Cugat’s orchestra for six months and then formed his own band. His first work as a director was with his La Contra Orchestra in around 1940 and his shows in New York created quite a buzz, enough to land a role in the Rodgers and Hart musical "Too many girls", in 1939. He repeated his role in "Too Many Girls" on the big screen, starting off his Hollywood career and his marriage to comedian Lucille Ball.

After military service during WWII, Arnaz concentrated on music for the rest of the 40’s, cutting a few contagious records for Victor between 1946 and 1949. Sure, some of the emphatic routines could also be repetitive, but he and his orchestra could also whip up a storm on the dance floors with songs like "Babalú" and "El Cumbanchero", achieving his goal of combining the Machito rhythm with Andre Kostelanetz’s melody. After recording his last session for Victor in 1949, Arnaz turned his attention back to Hollywood, putting his music career on a permanent back burner after getting to be one of the first television superstars with the show "I love Lucy".

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