Born in Banes, Cuba on January 31, 1913, pianist, bandleader, and composer Pedro
Nolasco Jústiz Rodríguez was better known by his stage name Peruchín. His
jazz-influenced form of Cuban music and his involvement in Havana’s descarga
scene in the 1950s had made him one of the most influential Cuban pianists of
all time. When he was young, he studied saxophone and piano but eventually had
to abandon the sax due to his asthma. His family relocated to Santiago de Cuba
in 1933, where he would eventually join Orquesta Chepín-Chovén. In the 1940s, he
played with several different ensembl...