By Roberto Llanos Rodado
In the mid-60s, when salsa was not known as salsa, but it was already breaking into Barranquilla as a musical tailgate of what was danced, listened to and enjoyed in New York and the Caribbean basin; In the city, a young man of about 18 years stood out in the party atmosphere of the then nascent city, like an excellent dancer of the wonderful Afro-Antillean rhythm.
Pepe Calvo It was the name by which everyone knew him, although in his documents he was registered as Roque Raúl Calvo García.
Many only found out about this real identity this Thursday, after his relatives announced that ‘Pepe’ had died in his residence in the Bello Horizonte housing complex, in the northern sector.
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Pepe Calvo was 85 years old, he died in the morning, and was buried on Friday, June 21, in the Jardínes de Paz cemetery, on the road to Puerto Colombia.
He had been suffering from kidney problems for some time, and had lost his vision, said his older sisters Dolores and Vilma. He doesn’t leave children.
Those who knew Pepe Calvo and saw him exhibit his art in bars and stadiums of the time, do not hesitate to classify him as a pioneer, who was followed in his footsteps by other great dancers until he reached those known today: Michi Boogaloo, Fredy Colombo, Jimmy Mambo (f), Willie Salsita, El Tongo, to mention a few.
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The musical environment was then dominated by the career of Cortijo, the Palmieri brothers, Machito, Tito Puentethe same Sonora Matanceraamong other groups.
“Pepe didn’t dance, he levitated, he was an avant-garde who showed a very unique choreography when he went out to dance what we now call salsa and which was initially called Antillean music”details his friend and neighbor in the Chiquinquirá neighborhood, Senén Sánchez, witness to the first samples of Calvo’s swing.
“We were young and during Carnival we danced at the Gigantona cumbiamba, on 39th Street (Las Flores) and 35th Street (Hospital), from there Pepe started dancing on the weekends in a place, right there, where they played that music”Sanchez also says.
Pepe Calvo reached ‘the big leagues’ as a dancer when he arrived at the bars and taverns of the old tolerance zone of the La Ceiba neighborhood, where he went on Saturdays and Sundays with his ‘combo’ of friends, which they previously called “galladas.” .
“He became famous and recognized on the slopes of Stop Bar, La Charanga, El Palo de Oro, Follies Berge, Gardenia Azul, La Fuente; and then in El Coreano, la Cien, Las Vegas, among other rumba establishments; although he also caused a sensation in the Jardín Águila and the Unión Española, dance halls that initiated the festivals “, remembers the friend. “People gathered around to see him dance, and it ended in applause.”, he adds.
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At that time Pepe Calvo He was a tall young man, he was approximately 1.78 tall and he dressed as the youth of the time did: tight jeans, long-sleeved sweaters or short-sleeved t-shirts, equally tight to the body.
“That style in the costumes was adopted by us boys of yesteryear from a movie that was all the rage at that time, West Side Historywhich was precisely about groups of young people from Puerto Rico and New York, who challenged each other to show who danced the best.”
Pepe Calvo had been away from the salsa circle in the city for many years, but his renown as a precursor among dancers was still valid, especially in the old school, which knew the rhythm when the salsa label was not on the horizon of what later would be the boom that still survives.
“In those days, Pepe was competed as dancers by Orlando Chavarro, a former employee of the now-defunct Social Security, and a very agile dancing cachaco, named Sammy Gómez, who lived in the Olaya neighborhood. concludes Senén Sánchez about his unforgettable friend and neighbor, Pepe Calvo.
