Artists and bandsJuan Luis Guerra
A Santo Domingo-born composer and singer who recorded his first album with the musicians who became 4.40.
A wish for rain and a house for music
Juan Luis Guerra was born in Santo Domingo, studied music there and returned after studying at Berklee in Boston. Back home, he recorded Soplando in 1984 with musicians who became the group 4.40. Roger Zayas-Bazán, one of the original members, recalled the group’s first public appearance in the gardens of the Teatro Nacional, on a bill with Guillo Carías’s Cuatro más Uno.
“Ojalá que llueva café” looks away from the city, toward the countryside. Guerra builds its wish for a better harvest around the impossible image of coffee falling from the sky. Food becomes a measure of abundance, and the merengue keeps that wish moving.
Another kind of musical gathering has a home in the Colonial City. Founded by Freddy Ginebra in 1974, Casa de Teatro grew beyond theatre to accommodate concerts and other arts. Its jazz programme places a different sound beside Guerra’s merengue; both offer ways into the capital’s musical life.
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