Marvin Santiago
Marvin Santiago (
December 26,
1947 -
October 6,
2004) was a
Puerto Rican salsa singer who became famous all across
Latin America during the
1970s. He was also a part-time
comedian on Puerto Rican television. His brother, Billiván Santiago, had some success in Puerto Rico as a
plena singer.
Santiago was born in San Juan. After residing in various neighborhoods in the city he moved to the
Nemesio Canales public housing project in his youth; he was eventually nicknamed
"El Grifo de Canales" ("The kinky-haired -fair skinned one- of Nemesio Canales) by close friends and fans.
Santiago was diagnosed with type 1
diabetes at a young age. He was groomed as a
bolero singer (a genre he didn't feel comfortable with) and was a struggling salsa singer (at one time he sang with
Rafael Cortijo) until
1971, when he joined
Bobby Valentin, another type 1 diabetic, as a duo. Their first
LP,
"Rompecabezas", ("Puzzle") sold well, and their second LP,
"Soy Boricua" ("I'm a Boricua") is considered by many to be a salsa classic and an informal patriotic anthem for Puerto Ricans. That album's title song and
"Pirata de la Mar" ("Pirate of the Seas"), both sung by Santiago, became major international hits.
The duo continued making hits during the decade of the 70s', and they were invited to form part of
The Fania All Stars, an exclusive salsa orchestra owned by
Fania Records and which included other performers such as
Celia Cruz,
Rubén Blades,
Pellin Rodriguez,
Roberto Roena,
Andy Montanez and many others.
Santiago went solo in 1977, and had a very successful pairing with producer and pianist Jorge Millet. In his solo records he improvised "soneos" (rhyming verses common to salsa) with a strong sense of
alliteration,
consonance and rhythm that was described once by
Ruben Blades this way: "(Rhythm-wise) Marvin is capable of fitting a
Mack truck into a parking space where a
Volkswagen Beetle won't fit." He also used strong Puerto Rican figures of speech and
slang that eventually granted him the moniker of
"El Sonero del Pueblo" (The People's Sonero). He attained a major Puerto Rican hit with Cortijo's song
"Fuego a la jicotea" ("(Light a) Fire to the (Green) Iguana), a thinly-veiled ode to
marijuana. Other hits were:
"Al Son de la Lata (baila el chorizo)", "El Mangoneo", "La Picúa" and
"Vasos de Colores".At the height of his popularity, however, Santiago was arrested and imprisoned for
cocaine possession. This was his second conviction, and the amount confiscated implied that he intended to distribute the drug. He served five out of nine years of a prison sentence. He became a
born-again Christian in prison.
After his drug conviction, Santiago's fame waned. Other notable facts that further pushed his fame decline included the surge of such
merengue groups as
Conjunto Quisqueya and the
Freddie Kenton orquestra, as well as new, local talent such as
Eddie Santiago and
Gilberto Santa Rosa. Marvin Santiago, however, kept a busy schedule through the
1980s, making several Latin American and inter-
Puerto Rico tours and appearing on Puerto Rican
television shows several times, ofen as a comedian.
His health began to decline during the
1990s, but he still went on with his music, releasing the "Donde lo Dejamos" ("Where we Left")
CD in
1992 alongside Valentin. Later on, a greatest hits CD of Santiago was released.
Santiago, who was nicknamed by his fans "
Marvin Hagler" both because of his first name and the fact that he was bold headed, had begun conversations to join a Fania All Stars comeback as a tribute to Celia Cruz by the summer of
2004, but then, he became severely ill.
He was blind from one
eye and suffered several
kidney,
heart and
liver damage on the weeks prior to his death.
At about noon AST on
October 6 2004, he died at a
Bayamón hospital.
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List of famous Puerto Ricans
