Tito Pvente Biography, ernest Anthony Puente Jr., better known as Tito Puente, is a well-known Puerto Rican-American musician, songwriter, bandleader, and record producer, he was created on April 20, 1923, at the Manhattan, New York borough of Harlem Hospital Center.
He is most renowned for his Latin jazz and mambo compositions, which have stood the test of time throughout a 50-year career. When it comes to his most well-known song, “Oye Como Va,” he is best known.
Not only that, but he also sang songs from movies like Fernando Trueba’s Calle 54 and The Mambo Kings throughout his performances. He appeared in a number of television programs as a guest star, including Sesame Street and the two-part “Who Shot Mr. Burns?” episode of The Simpsons.
Stateside Puerto Ricans living in New York City’s Spanish Harlem neighborhood welcomed Tito Puente into the world on April 20, 1923. Tito Puente is a well-known American musician, songwriter, bandleader, and record producer.
Ernest Puente (the father) and Ercilia Puente were his parents (mother). Although he was raised in a separate region of the US, he spent the majority of his life in Spanish Harlem. In a razorblade plant, his father served as the foreman.
Despite being born in the United States, Tito placed a high value on his sense of ethnic identity and spoke with a strong accent right up to his passing. According to Wikipedia, he had severe hyperactivity as a child. Even after his neighbors complained that they could hear Puente, then seven years old, banging on pots and window frames, his mother enrolled him in 25-cent piano lessons, by the time he was ten, he had turned to percussion and was influenced by jazz drummer Gene Krupa.
In the 1930s, he and his sister Anna formed a song-and-dance pair, later in life, he also aspired to be a dancer, but owing to an ankle tendon injury, he was unable to do so, puente replaced the drummer in Machito’s band after he was called up to the army.
The most searched-for name on the internet right now is Tito Puente. Here, I give a brief summary of all the pertinent information. The table below will allow you to swiftly find out all the pertinent information about him.
| Fullname | Ernest Anthony Puente Jr. |
| Nickname | Tito Puente |
| Date of birth | April 20, 1923 |
| Birthplace | New York City, U.S. |
| Died | June 1, 2000, at 2:27am |
| Profession | Musician, Song Writer, Record Producer |
| Nationality | American |
| Hometown | New York |
| Educational Qualifications | Graduate from The Juilliard School |
| Wife Name | Margaret Asencio |
| Parents Name | Father’s name- Ernest Puente, Mother’s name- Ercilia Puente |
| Religion | Christian |
| Famous for | Google Doodle honored on Oct 11, 2000 |
Net worth
Puente, a Latin jazz and salsa artist from the United States, had a $5 million fortune. Tito Puente was born Ernesto Antonio Puente on July 23, 1923 in New York City, New York. Puente was frequently referred to as The Musical Pope, The King of Latin Music, and El Rey de los Timbales (The King of the Timbales). He had a 50-year career and was most known for his Latin jazz and mambo compositions, which are dance-oriented. Many movies, like The Mambo Kings and Fernando Trueba’s Calle 54, include Puente and his music. Additionally, he appeared in various television programs as a guest star, including The Simpsons’ Who Shot Mr. Burns?, a two-part episode of The Cosby Show, and Sesame Street.
Puente, a New York City native and the son of Puerto Rican immigrants, started playing music professionally at the age of 13 and grew up in Spanish Harlem. He began learning to play the piano when he was young and then picked up the percussion, saxophone, vibraphone, and timbales. Puente served in the U.S, navy during World War II after serving as an apprentice in the famous Machito Orchestra.
In order to attend the renowned Juilliard School in New York City, he moved back to the city in 1945. In 1948, he started a band that would become known as the Tito Puente Orchestra. By the 1950s, Puente was drawing sizable crowds and was well-known throughout Latin music. Puente’s best-selling record, Dance Mania, was published in 1958, and other hits soon followed.
Puente has collaborated with numerous notable jazz musicians during his career, in addition to numerous symphony orchestras. Puente won multiple honors for his work, five of them were Grammy Awards. Puente received an honorary degree from Columbia University in 1999. In New York City, Ernesto Antonio “Tito” Puente passed away on June 1, 2000, at the age of 77.
Many individuals are interested in learning more about his professional background because they have heard of him but don’t know much about him. Here, we’ll go through his professional background, puente was conscripted in 1942 and served in the Navy for three years during the Second World War, for participating in nine combat on the escort carrier USS Santee, he received a Presidential Unit Citation upon his discharge CVE-29.
He was able to attend the Juilliard School of Music to study music thanks to the GI Bill, where he received a formal education in conducting, orchestration, and theory. All we do is play jazz with a Latin flavor, you know.
He was at the pinnacle of his career in 1950 and was instrumental in popularizing Afro-Cuban and Caribbean music like the mambo, son, and cha-cha-chá. He was performing popular Afro-Cuban rhythms at the time and was so well-known and successful that many people wrongly thought he was Cuban.
His most well-known album, Dance Mania, came out in 1958, if we’re talking about that. His 1963 cha-cha composition “Oye como va,” which was made popular by Latin rock musician Carlos Santana and later covered by artists like Julio Iglesias, Irakere, and Celia Cruz, is one of his most well-known works, former Mayor John Lindsay gave him the key to the City of New York in 1969, he was admitted to the National Congressional Record in 1992, and the Smithsonian awarded him the James Smithson Bicentennial Medal in 1993.
Early in 2000, he made an appearance in the music documentary Calle 54. His name is also mentioned in the television program La Epoca, which is about the New York Palladium era, Afro-Cuban music and rhythms, the mambo and salsa as dances and musical genres, among other things.
Numerous contributions made by Puente and Arsenio Rodriguez are discussed in the movie, which also includes interviews with several of the musicians Puente collaborated with on recordings, including Alfonso “El Panameno” Joseph.
Death
He had a severe heart attack on May 31, 2000, after performing in Puerto Rico. He was transported to New York City for heart valve repair surgery, but complications led to his death on June 1, 2000, at 2:27 a.m. [10] In 2003, he received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award posthumously.