The Puerto Rican Cuatro Project
CULTURAL ARCHIVES
FOLKLORIC RESEARCH
EDUCATIONAL PRODUCTS
El Proyecto del Cuatro Puertorriqueño
Cuatro Project Staff
A deep commitment to our traditional music
LANGUAGE IDIOMA
Thanks to the magic of Photoshop, Wilfredo EchevarrÃa has placed our project on the iconic marquee of the Puerto Rico Theater in New York. Members of the Project, in addition to stellar figures from the world of cuatro, are among the public.
Founding members
Juan Sotomayor was the first Puerto Rican photographer to be employed by the New York Times newspaper. He is now retired, living in Moca, Puerto Rico, and works full time for the Cuatro Project. (Photo: Lee Romero)
Juan Sotomayor is co-founder of the Puerto Rican Cuatro Project. Its function is to conduct and collect oral interviews; collect audio samples from the field; researcher of published sources and archival material; collector of old photographs and creator of an extensive archive of original photographs; and finally the creator of a historical chronology of the cuatro and its music .
He was born in New York City on February 17, 1940, the son of Puerto Rican parents. When he lived in New Jersey, he was an accomplished photographer, working since 1966 for the distinguished New York Times newspaper.
Now retired, Juan is also an expert guitarist and cuatro player, a member of numerous professional groups, having recorded for the Ansonia label in 1957. He currently resides in Moca, Puerto Rico, where he dedicates full time to researching the traditions surrounding the national instrument. John maintains his own native instruments page . You can contact Juan Sotomayor by email by clicking here .
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Our principal investigator Juan Sotomayor recorded with the Ansonia label in 1955 as lead guitar of the Los Duques Trio (left) The members were: our principal investigator Juan Sotomayor recorded with the Ansonia label in 1955 as lead guitar of the Los Duques Trio (left) The members were: Juan Sotomayor, Filo del Moral and Vitín Pagán.
Hear two pieces by Juan and the Trio Los Duques in 1955
El coordinador del Proyecto, William Cumpiano es un artesano profesional de instrumentos de cuerda y autor de un reconocido libro de texto en su campo, GUITARMAKING: Tradition & Technology
William Cumpiano is co-founder of the Puerto Rican Cuatro Project. His function has been as organizer and transcriptionist of all the graphic and textual materials, administrator of our web page, and as facilitator, conceptualizer and coordinator of the Project.
Cumpiano was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1945. He has resided in western Massachusetts for twenty-five years. After graduating with a bachelor's degree in industrial design, he worked in that field for several years in New York. During this time he met
Michael Gurian, master guitar player from New York, with whom he began his apprenticeship as a guitar craftsman. In 1974, he became a full-time independent guitar maker, opening his own workshop in Massachusetts. He has been and remains a professional luthier ever since, as well as a writer and teacher of his craft. He was a founding member and former president of the Association of Stringed Instrument Craftsmen (ASIA)--an international society of the profession-- and gave speeches at that organization's conventions as well as the American Luthiers Guild (GAL) conventions. He is the co-author of GUITARMAKING: Tradition and Technology , a textbook for guitar building, which has been hailed as the standard reference book in the field. His work has been recognized by the American Institute of Architects, and also by the Smithsonian Institution. The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) recently awarded him an award as part of its Folkloric Traditions Apprenticeship Program, to allow him to teach the construction technique of cuatros to young Puerto Rican artisans. You can visit William's personal page by clicking here .
Wilfredo EchevarrÃa is an award-winning producer of educational television programs, editor and director of video documentaries, who has created documentaries summarizing the findings of the Cuatro Project on full-length video-DVD.
Wilfredo Echevarria is a media communications expert who has directed numerous major projects for the Puerto Rican Cuatro Project, including the feature-length video documentary NUESTRO CUATRO, Volumes 1 and 2, and a series of short documentaries.
Wilfredo Echevarria was born in Isabela, Puerto Rico. His family came to New York in 1952. He joined William Cumpiano and Juan Sotomayor in the summer of 1994 to assist in the production of the First Four Festival at the Children's Museum in Holyoke, Massachusetts. That event became the beginning of what would become a tradition of cuatro festivals throughout the United States and Puerto Rico produced, sponsored or made in collaboration with the Project. Echevarria began working in the media while studying at the SUNY/Buffalo University of New York. He was the host of several radio programs on the public station of the University. While in Buffalo, he also co-founded a Latino community newspaper, hosted a public affairs program on the ABC Radio affiliate station, worked as a production technician on the public television station, co-founded a company theater and puppetry for children, and was a partner in a graphic arts company. While Echevarria was teaching a video workshop on a city-run show, he was offered the position of assistant director of community affairs for the NBC network affiliate in Hartford, Connecticut.
There he produced three weekly shows, a monthly documentary that won the National IRIS Award for Best Documentary in 1984, and also created public service announcements.
Echevarria moved to the city of Springfield, Massachusetts to work there at the city's public television station. There he animated and produced a series of live programs from the different ethnic neighborhoods of the city. He also produced a weekly political roundtable discussion show, and produced and hosted political election coverage programs and a series of television documentaries, earning his second Emmy nomination for a documentary on the Tuskegee African-American pilots, Alabama during World War II.
Echevarria also worked with the Springfield Museum Association on the design of their new television station and led a committee to set up the museum's cable TV station. Echevarria currently produces computer- and other media-based teaching courses and web-based materials for the University of Connecticut School of Social Work.
Wilfredo EchevarrÃa con su cámara de vÃdeo durante una de varias visitas a Hawaii en 1996 donde el Proyecto estudió las costumbres musicales de los puertorriqueños que llegaran in 1911 y donde quedaron preservadas muchas tradiciones puertorriqueñas del siglo 19. A su derecha se encuentra el coordinador del Proyecto William Cumpiano. Foto de Juan Sotomayor
Associate Members
Collector/folklorist David Morales interviews the great decimist troubadour Baltazar Carrero at his home in Rio Piedras in 2004. Photo by William Cumpiano
David Morales is one of the leading experts in the field of sung and recorded jÃbara music, and he, along with his father, owns one of the largest collections--if not the largest collection--of original records of traditional Puerto Rican music. His research on the life and work of our most admired jÃbaro musicians and singers includes the compilation of the history of the great troubadour ChuÃto el de Cayey published in the important annual magazine La Canción Popular.
David Morales graduated from Bowdoin College in 1997. For the next three years he served as Budget Analyst for the Massachusetts House Ways and Means Committee, where he managed a significant portion of the state budget and advised the Committee on policy matters. and legislation. From 2000 to 2001, David Morales served as an advisor to the Speaker of the House of Representatives on health care policy and state finances.
In 2001, David Morales served as Executive Director of the first national prescription drug insurance plan for seniors, called Prescription Advantage, where he managed a $140 million resource organization with more than 70 employees, serving more than 90,000 people. insured individuals.
With his extensive commitment to community activities, David Morales founded and chaired El Jolgorio de Massachusetts, Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering leadership, civic engagement, and academic achievement among young Latinos. In January 2003, David Morales accepted the position as Senior Advisor to the President of the Massachusetts Senate, advising the President on policy matters, including state finances, health care, and legislative matters. In 2007 he joined the task force of the new Governor of Massachusetts Deval Patrick.
He currently works as the vice president of a company that manages a network of hospitals throughout the state of Massachusetts. David Morales lives in Lynn, Massachusetts with his wife Samanda Morales and their two children.
Myriam Fuentes has been invited to the staff of the Puerto Rican Cuatro Project to assist in the preparation and implementation of the Project's educational materials.
Myriam Fuentes is a historian, economist and filmmaker. He runs his own electronic media production company, Producciones Yierbamora , which filmed and directed the Project's documentary on DVD titled La Décima Borinqueña , and sections of the Project's documentary titled Nuestro Cuatro Vol.2 . He participated in a significant way in the writing and organization of the textbook of the Cuerdas de mi Tierra Project, which deals with the history and development of the typical string instruments of Puerto Rico.
Carlos Flores is coordinator of the Cuatro Project in Chicago and archivist-historian of the great Puerto Rican community in that great city.
Carlos Flores is a versatile writer, photographer, historian, cultural promoter, and community organizer. It produces the oldest annual festival of Latin Jazz in Chicago, as well as an annual workshop for making the Puerto Rican tiple of the big city, in force for more than a decade. You can contact Carlos Flores by clicking here . The Puerto Rican Chicago website highlights his life and work.