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The Story of Hector Lavoe

There’s a lot of buzz being generated over the August, 2007 release of El Cantante, starring husband and wife team Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony. Salsa music fans have been eagerly awaiting the film’s release for over a year now. PictureHouse bought the North American rights to the film for a whopping $5 million after it premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last fall.

So, who was Hector Lavoe, ‘el cantante de los cantantes’?
The life of Hector Lavoe should be that uplifting story of an immigrant who came to the U.S. with a dream and the talent to make that dream come true. And in many ways, it is.

Hector Juan Perez was born in 1946 in Ponce, Puerto Rico. His family lived in the city’s Machuelito barrio and, against his parent’s wishes, he set out for New York at the age of 17. He had big dreams of finding fame and fortune in the city’s exciting and colorful Latin music scene.

It didn’t take him long. During his first week in New York, he was invited by a friend and fellow musician to attend a rehearsal of a newly formed band. The lead vocalist was rehearsing a song, “Tus Ojos” and Lavoe thought he would help out by demonstrating how the song should really be sung. By the end of the demo, he had a job.

He spent the next few years performing with various Latin bands. A local promoter took him under his wing and suggested he change his name to Lavoe as reminiscent of “La Voz” (The Voice).
El Cantante opens for general release August 11th

The timing of Lavoe’s entrance into the New York Latin music scene was extremely fortunate. A new type of Latin music was gaining popularity, first in New York, then in much of Latin America, finally spreading worldwide. The music was called ‘salsa’ and the record label that had the corner on salsa was Fania Records. Started by Dominican bandleader Johnny Pacheco and Jerry Masucci, Fania had the corner on all the great salsa artists – Celia Cruz, Willie Colon, Ruben Blades, Ray Barretto and a host of other Latin music legends.

Lavoe met Johnny Pacheco, and through him the young Willie Colon. Colon hired Lavoe, and together they made salsa history with albums such as El Malo and Cosa Nuestra. But like his brother before him, who had died in New York of a drug overdose, Lavoe fell into the same trap that has destroyed so many talented musicians. Drugs became his vehicle for trying to cope with such early and unexpected success.

Soon, Lavoe was showing up for gigs late or not showing up at all, resulting in a split with Colon that emotionally devastated Lavoe. Colon urged him to start his own group, which Lavoe did. Over the years, he attained the status that is denied to many great artists; he became a legend in his own time.

Well, that was the immigrant dream part of the story. But unlike fairy tales, he didn’t live happily ever after. Lavoe was plagued with a series of tragedies over the course of his life, a victim to fate. Along with his fight against drugs, his mother died young, his mother-in-law was brutally murdered, his house in Queens was burned to the ground and, finally, his 17 year-old-son was accidentally shot by a friend. These and other events sapped his strength and resolve and one day he jumped from his hotel room in Puerto Rico. He didn’t die, but he never fully recovered from his injuries.

Hector Lavoe died in poverty on June 29, 1993 in New York.

El Cantante is not the first dramatization of this extraordinary man’s life. In the

In the late 1990’s, Quien Mato a Hector Lavoe? (Who Killed Hector Lavoe?) , starring Domingo Quinones was a great success off-Broadway. There’s also another Hector Lavoe biopic that has just finished filming, this one starring Raul Carbonnell and named The Singer.

As for the film El Cantante, there are two big questions in my mind. With a big name star like Jennifer Lopez playing Puchi, Lavoe’s wife, there’s bound to be a focus on Lopez/Puchi that might detract from the story line (and worse, might detract from the music). Will she help or hinder the story?

And the big question: can Marc Anthony musically pull-off becoming “La Voz” for two hours?

Now there’s a question you can answer for yourself. July saw the release of two CD’s: the first is the soundtrack of El Cantante with Anthony singing the songs Lavoe made famous. But even more interesting is the release of another album named El Cantante: The Originals, this one on the Fania label and sung by Lavoe. It has the exact same track listing as the Anthony CD so you can listen to them side and make up your own mind.

El Cantante opens for general release August 11th.
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