Ramón Cordero

ALBUMS

Born April 26, 1939. Died January 19, 2017
From the mid 1960’s to the present, Ramón Cordero’s high, plaintive voice has been one of the most distinctive in bachata. During the 1970s and 1980s he was also one of the genre’s most successful artists. Many of his songs, characterized by unusually good production quality and the arrangements of some of bachata’s most virtuoso guitar players, have become classics.

Mexican singers like Antonio Aguilar and Pedro Infante had a great deal of influence on Cordero, and he recorded many of their songs as bachatas. He has also at times recorded rancheras in their original 2/4 or 3/4 time (as opposed to bachata’s standard 4/4 bolero arrangement), but adding to them bachata’s rhythmic almost percussive style of guitar accompaniment. A good example of Cordero’s hybrid ranchera-bachata style is “Yo la recuerdo”, which he recorded with Paredes. Other songs were culled from Puerto Rican jíbaro music or baladas like “Condenado a la distancia”. These songs, many of them Mexican, which he recorded in the 1970s with Edilio Paredes playing the lead guitar— songs like “Vuela paloma”, “Entre copa y copa” and “Las nieves de enero”— remain the trademark and mainstay of his repertoire.

The name most linked to Ramon Cordero’s is that of Edilio Paredes, who grew up with him in the campo of San Felipe, near San Francisco de Macoris. Ramon and Edilio began playing together in the countryside, and when Paredes traveled to the capital, Santo Domingo, Ramon soon followed. The two sang as a duo on one of Cordero’s most successful early recordings, “Yo la recuerdo”, recorded on Cuco Valoy’s label in 1966. After Cordero had released several recordings with Casa Alegre, Bienvenido Ortiz’ label, Paredes helped him to get a job at CMV Records, Cuco Valoy’s music store, and they began recording together for Valoy. Ramón Cordero went on to record some of the most cherished bachatas of the next two decades, among them the song which came to be his anthem and Edilio Paredes’ hallmark as a guitarist, “Amor del bueno” (1974). The song "Amor del bueno" is featured on iASO's "Bachata Roja" compilation.

Paredes’ virtuoso arrangements have made Cordero’s repertoire one of bachata’s most difficult to master. For this reason, Cordero has at one time or another been accompanied by some of the Dominican Republic’s finest guitarists, including Augusto Santos, Frank Mendez, Virgilio de la Cruz and Mártires de León. Apart from accompanying him in live performances, where his agility qualified him as one of the few musicians who were able to play Cordero’s music as it was originally recorded, Santos and Cordero formed the duo “Los Inimitables”. Their collaboration resulted in some of the most memorable vocal duets in bachata history, among them ”Con golpes de pecho” and “Negra ¿porque me dejaste?”. Augusto Santo also recorded the lead guitar on the 1967 single “La causa de mi muerte”, one of Cordero’s best-loved songs.

Bachata was changed forever by the all-important introduction of the electric guitar by Blas Durán in 1987. While a new generation of bachateros began to acquire an international fame undreamed of by their predecessors, bachateros like Ramón Cordero, who continued to record and perform with acoustic instruments, continued performing for mostly local audiences. During the 1990s, though, the virtuoso playing and high production values of Cordero’s work attracted the attention of fellow musicians, even masters of the contemporary electric style, like Martires De León, who recorded the lead guitar on Cordero’s extremely successful CD “Manantial de amor”.

Because of his perfectly tuned voice and his instinctive feel for singing, Cordero has was sought out as a vocal director for studios like ENCA and ENFI in Santo Domingo. The duet of Monchy and Alexandra is an example of the quality of Cordero’s work as a director.

Before passing away in January 2017, Cordero was working to revive and internationalize classic acoustic bachata. Together with El Chivo Sin Ley, Edilio Paredes and Joan Soriano, he had formed The Bachata Legends band, which released an album in 2011, and toured in the USA and Europe. iASO Records recorded extensively with Ramon and the Bachata Legends, and will be releasing more of his last recordings.
-- David Wayne

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nelson jorge April 10, 2016

el mejor cantante para mi bien afinado

jorge mateo March 28, 2016

ramon megustaria poderme contactar soy un fiel ollente de su musica y me gustaria darle ese regalo a mi padre de que usted le cante una fiesta

Miguel Abad February 29, 2016

Este es el tipo de ocnttenidos que deberías tener en tu iPhone 6

bit.ly/1TGUyQ5

Junior guzman el seybano October 30, 2015

Mis respetos a tan gran artista nuestro,de tantos bachateros de la Rep. Dom, solo dos llenan mis gustos por el genero,usted es el primero y el otro es el fenecido Juan Bautista el melódico.

Hector Nieve Jimenez March 15, 2015

para mi es el mejor y mas completo bachatero de este pais umildes la voz mas linda de la bachata que grandes es ramon cordero que dios le de larga vida

alexis santos medina September 23, 2014

el que no as escuchado a rramon cordero no as escuchado bachata porque es lo mejo de lo mejor ami me encantan

Elvis July 11, 2014

Yo quiero la discografia de Ramon cordero tengo muchas canciones pero aun me faltan,El que pueda interesarle tambien tengo mas Bachateros viejos que podemos intercambiar.

Papoyile June 23, 2014

El mejor de todos los bachatero

Jefe Montana "los cuarteleros" March 25, 2014

Con todo el respeto me gustaria samplear las voces de usted del tema entre copa y copa para un Nuevo prejecto en la musica urbana que estamos trabajando para este verano...vamos a ser algo al estilo para la nueva escuela pero tambien revivir la musica que le dio la luz and nuestro paiz..si podamos hacer esto se puedo comunicar conmigo via facebook "jefe Montana"

EMILIO October 29, 2013

ME GUSTARIA HABLAR CONTIGO, PARA UN PROYECTO INMEDIATO