THE SALSA GIANT

Alvaro José Arroyo González was a song writer who was born on November the first of 1955 in Cartagena de Indias, and died the 26 of July of 2011 in Barranquilla. His musician career began when he was a child, when at the age of eight years began to sing in the popular tropical band “Fruko y sus Tesos”, where the bass player and band director saw his talent and signed with the colombian music label “Discos Fuentes”. José worked with the band for ten years.

After leaving the band he began his career as soloist. In 1981 he founded his own band which was called “La Verdad”. This band mixed the salsa with Caribbean rhythms like porro, chandé, cumbia and others, until he created his own rhythm called “Joesón”.

With this band, Joe won lots of prizes and was even the king of the Carnaval de Barranquilla winning eighteen golden congos and two super golden congos, which were prizes made especially for him. His songs were not only nationally recognized, but also were welcomed by other countries as in Mexico.

Since 1980 Joe Arroyo suffered lots of health deceases that made him cancel several concerts, that’s why sometimes people thought he was dead. In 1983 he had a problem with retrospective thyroid, this didn´t allowed him to make presentations.

Also in the 2000 he was about to die because of a diabetic coma and pneumonia. From late June he was internee in the hospital “La Asunción de Barranquilla”, where he was connected to an artificial breather and a tracheotomy was made. After this he died because of a respiratory stoppage.

THE SALSA GIANT

Who is Joe Arroyo to me?