The late legendary Cuban singer is now depicted on a U.S. quarter.
Widely known as the Queen of Salsa, Cruz was chosen along with four other exemplary women from history to be featured on the U.S. quarter as part of the American Women Quarters Program this year.
She also makes history as the first Afro-Latina to appear on the coin.
“Celia received so many accolades during her lifetime that it was hard to expect a greater honor than what she had already accumulated during her legendary career,” said Omer Pardillo-Cid, Cruz’s last artistic representative and the executor of her estate, in a press release. “But to have been honored by the U.S. Mint in this way is something that would have surprised her greatly since she was a simple and humble woman.”
Celebrated for her iconic shout “¡Azúcar!” — a phrase also inscribed on the coin — Cruz is acknowledged as a cultural symbol and an influential vocalist in history, boasting nearly 40 albums.
On the U.S. quarter, she is depicted in her customary Cuban attire, captured with her characteristic vivacity.0
The U.S. Mint’s other 2024 honorees are Patsy Takemoto Mink, the first woman of color to serve in Congress; Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, a women’s rights advocate and Civil War era surgeon; poet, activist, and lawyer Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray; and Native American writer, composer, educator and political activist Zitkala-Ša.
The four-year American Women Quarters Program “celebrates the accomplishments and contributions made by women of the United States,” states the official website, which also sells the coins individually and as a set.
“All of the women honored have unique accomplishments that have significantly impacted the history of our nation,” said Ventris C. Gibson, director of the Mint, in a press release.
Lucrecia is ready to bring a legend’s story to life in the Big Apple…
The Lehman Center for the Performing Arts has just announced the New York premiere of Celia Cruz: The Musical!,starring the 52-year-old Cuban singer as the late Queen of Salsa, scheduled for November 16.
The show, which premiered at the Starlite Festival in Marbella, Spain, and has been performed at Miami’s Adrienne Arscht Center, was written and directed by Gonzalo Rodríguez and Jeffry Batista, with Omer Pardillo-Cid, the executor of the Celia Cruz Estate, as executive producer.
Pardillo has described Cruz as “a black woman, who was poor, who left Cuba and conquered the world,” becoming, he says, “the Lady Gagaof her time.”
The musical, which Pardillo ensures tells the true story of the woman known all over the world as the “salsa queen,” re-creates Cruz’s final concert before her death in 2003 at age 77, flashing back to episodes cued by well-known songs, from “Quimbara”to “La Negra Tiene Tumbao.”
“Celia conquered the world with her voice and her huge heart,” Lucrecia says. “She was noble, a woman of the old school. She remembered everyone’s name. You’d meet her once and she’d be sending you postcards for the rest of her life.”
During the show, Lucrecia makes 18 costume changes, wearing dresses and wigs that a Miami seamstress painstakingly copied from Cruz’s original show wardrobe. The singer performs monologues that encapsulate different periods of Cruz’s life, setting up songs that took her career from Cuba, where as a young woman she had her big break with La Sonora Matancera, to the heady days of New York salsa with the Fania All Stars, to her later years as an international icon.
“My admiration, respect and love for Celia runs very deep,” Lucrecia says. “I do the show with love, without any sense of rivalry or trying to take her place. I come out on stage to bring her alive.”
Lucrecia, whose given name is Lucrecia Pérez-Saéz, became known in Cuba as a lead vocalist and pianist with the iconic all-women band Anacaona. In 1993, she settled in Barcelona and formed her own group. The Latin Grammynominee (for 2010’s Álbum de Cuba), frequently recognized on the street by her trademark colored braids, is now a household name in Spain for her role as the singing host of the children’s television series Los Lunnis; she also appears in movie based on the series that premiered in Spanish theaters early this year.
Lucrecia is set to receive recognition as the Best Latin American Children’s Movie Actress and Best Children’s Music Singer at the Premios Latino 2019 awards in Marbella in September.
In 1998, Lucrecia appeared with Cruz, the great bassist Israel “Cachao” Lopez and actor, musician and producer Andy Garcia at an event organized by Bacardi rum in Marbella.
“I met her at the press conference,” she recalls. “I was so nervous.” During that presentation, Cruz called Lucrecia her successor. Lucrecia wrote a song in Cruz’s honor, “Agua con Azucar y Ron.”
Lucrecia recalls Cruz calling her when she was pregnant, and later bringing gifts for her son. “La Vida Es un Carnaval” was the first song that Lucrecia sang to him in the hospital. They remained friends until the end of Cruz’s life.
“Celia’s career was long, and when you have a career like that you can start on one path and then take another,” notes Lucrecia. “Of course, there are evolutions,” she says, pointing to Cruz’s 2001, “La Negra Tiene Tumbao,” which has an urban beat and premiered accompanied by a fabulous video by Cuban director Ernesto Fundora.
“Reggaeton was just coming out at that time, and there she was, doing reggaeton!
“They called her the queen of salsa,” Lucrecia adds, “but she was always the guarachera de Cuba. It was always about her Cuba, and taking it with her around the world.”
Widely known as the Queen of Salsa, Cruz was chosen along with four other exemplary women from history to be featured on the U.S. quarter as part of the American Women Quarters Program this year.
