An Ear for Music

Even before the Great Depression of the 1930s, many hungry children in New York without supervision would eat their crayons, swallow white paste, chew tar like gum, and ingest lead paint for salt. It was this lead, not decibels, that damaged my hearing. However, this unfortunate handicap served to introduce me to the exquisite sounds of Latin music.

The vibrating chords of a solo organ playing “Siboney” awoke a withdrawn child. The penetrating sounds of this grand orchestral device came from thousands of miles away, from the Hotel Nacional in Havana. “Siboney,” the theme song of the Lecuona Cuban Boys, came in via shortwave radio, full of static, fading in and out, at times completely silent, clearer in summer than winter and very late at night. “Turn off that radio!” my dad would shout from the other room. Turning down the volume a wee bit, I would bring the radio under the sheets with me, married as it were, to the music. Next day, I would fall asleep in class.

Between my family’s understandable protests, the poor reception in the early days of radio, and my troubled hearing, I could only remain frustrated by this foreign music. These novel sounds were unknown in this country during the 1930s, except for one magical tune that was heard around the world: “El Manisero.” I became determined to someday track down this elusive, enticing music to its source.

Today, some seventy years later, I still bring my radio up to my ear by using earphones, and while my hearing has worsened, the technology has improved. In 1941, the composer of “Siboney” invited me into his dressing room. He sat down at a small piano and, looking directly into my eyes, began to play “Estas Siempre en Mi Corazon.” “You are the first one to hear this song,” he said. This is where the music has been all these years, I thought…always in my heart