Oscar Alemán

Oscar Marcelo Alemán was born February 20, 1909, in Machagai, Chaco Province, in northern Argentina. At the age of six, Alemán joined the family ensemble, the Moreira Sextet, and played the cavaquinho, a chordophone related to the ukulele, before taking up the guitar.

Alemán was orphaned aged 10, and afterward sustained himself by working sporadically as a dancer and musician on the streets of Santos, Brazil. When he saved enough money, he bought a guitar and started to play professionally at party venues in a duo called Los Lobos with his friend, Brazilian guitarist Gastón Bueno Lobo. The duo moved to Buenos Aires in 1925 to work under contract for the comedian Pablo Palitos. In Buenos Aires, they formed a trio with violinist Elvino Vardaro.

In 1929 Los Lobos and dancer Harry Fleming traveled to Europe. After the tour, Alemán stayed in Madrid to play as a soloist. In the 1930s he discovered American jazz through the music of Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti. He then moved to Paris, where he was hired by Josephine Baker to lead her band, the Baker Boys, at the Cafe de Paris, providing him an opportunity to play regularly with American musicians who would come to see Baker and perform with her band. In Paris he met and befriended Django Reinhardt, for whom he would sometimes substitute.

Throughout the 1930s Alemán toured Europe, both as a member of Josephine Baker’s band and independently, playing with Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington before forming a nine-piece band which would performed nightly at the Le Chantilly in Paris.

During the Nazi invasion of France during World War II Alemán returned to Argentina and was lauded as the most prominent Afro-Argentine and Argentine jazz musician. There he established a residency at the Alvear Palace Hotel. Alemán also continued to record and perform with a swing quintet and a nine-piece orchestra, remaining popular into the late 1950s. In 1972, Alemán recorded an album and reissued some of his older music. During the 1970s, he toured and appeared on television. Oscar Alemán performed and taught in his native country until his death on October 17, 1980, at the age of 71. – adapted from Wikipedia