Edmundo Ros Rumba King – Phantom Dancer 1 June 2021

Edmund William Ross was born in Port of Spain, Trinidad.His mother Luisa Urquart was a Venezuelan teacher, thought to be descended from indigenous Caribs. His father, William Hope-Ross, was of Scottish and black descent. Ros began his musical career in the Venezuelan army.

He was timpanist in the Venezuelan Symphony Orchestra and was a member of the Caracas Martial Band. He moved to London in 1937 on a Venezuelan Government scholarship to study harmony, composition and orchestration at the Royal Academy of Music. At the same time he was the vocalist and percussionist in Don Marino Baretto’s band at the Embassy Club. He recorded several sides as a sideman to Fats Waller, who was visiting London in 1938.

His five-piece Rumba Band was a runaway hit, playing for high society and international royalty. His music was so popular that then-Princess Elizabeth had her first public dance to the sound of Ros’ band in the 1940s. As queen, she would award him the Order of the British Empire for his services to entertainment. Ros was effectively London’s “ambassador for Latin American music,” his son Douglas told the Associated Press.

The prolific artist made more than 800 recordings over the course of his career. His 1949 number, “The Wedding Samba,” sold 3 million copies. His band was a fixture at Regent Street’s Coconut Grove club, which he bought in 1951 and counted Britain’s Princess Margaret, Monaco’s Prince Rainier and Sweden’s Prince Bertil among its regulars. The club’s demanding standards — ladies wearing broad-brimmed hats or trousers were denied admittance — kept the clientele exclusive through the 1950s, but the relaxation of Britain’s gambling laws in the 1960s began to hit his takings. Ros sold the club and later retired to the Spanish resort city of Alicante.

ROS

In August 1940, Ros formed his own orchestra, performing as Edmundo Ros and His Rumba Band in the style of Lecuona Cuban Boys. Hee cut his first tracks with Parlophone in 1941, the first number being “Los Hijos de Buda”.  Ros’s bands were always based in London nightclubs or restaurants. The first was the Cosmo Club in Wardour Street; then followed the St Regis Hotel, Cork Street, the Coconut Grove and the Bagatelle Restaurant, that opened the doors for Ros and high society.

All the leaders of Allied Countries in World War II and the Royal Family came there to dine and listen to Edmundo’s Rumba Band. At the Bagatelle a visit from Princess Elizabeth and party made his name. The future queen danced in public for the first time to Edmundo’s music. By then, with his gently rhythmic style and engaging vocals, he was enormously popular with the public generally, and his orchestra was often invited to play at Buckingham Palace.

By 1946 Ros owned a club, a dance school, a record company and an artistes’ agency. His band grew to 16 musicians and was renamed Edmundo Ros and His Orchestra.

His 1949 hit, “The Wedding Samba“, sold three million 78s. His album Rhythms of The South (1958) sold a million copies. He was with Decca Records from 1944 to 1974, and altogether he made more than 800 recordings. In 1951 Ros bought the “Coconut Grove” on Regent Street and in 1964 renamed it “Edmundo Ros’s Dinner and Supper Club”. The club became popular for ts atmosphere and music, but it closed in 1965, when legalised casino gambling had drawn away many of its best customers.

During the 1950s and 1960s the Ros orchestra appeared frequently on BBC Radio, continuing into the early 1970s on Radio Two Ballroom. In 1975, during Ros’s seventh tour of Japan, his band’s Musicians’ Union shop steward tried to usurp Ros’s authority by making arrangements with venues behind his back. Upon their return to the UK Ros organised a celebratory dinner after a BBC recording session and announced the disbanding of the orchestra. He destroyed almost all the band charts which conclusively ended the orchestra’s existence.

In 1994, Edmundo conducted and sang with the BBC Big Band with Strings at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London. The other conductor was Stanley Black.^[3] The concert was broadcast over BBC Radio 2 .

HONOURS

Ros was initiated into the exclusive entertainment fraternity, the Grand Order of Water Rats on October 4, 1964. A year and a half later he was made a Freeman of the City of London, having been admitted to the Freedom of the Worshipful Company of Poulters on 5 January 1965 and subsequently clothed with the Livery of the Poulters’ Company on 22 June 1965. He was a Freemason, initiated into the Chelsea Lodge No 3098 and a Founder Member and Worshipful Master of Lodge of Ascension No 7358; on retirement a member of Sprig of Acacia Lodge No 41, Javea, Spain. He became a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in 1991.

He normally was nicknamed by fans and journalists as the King of Latin Music. In the 2000 New Year Honours, Ros (then aged 90), was appointed by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II as Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in ceremony at Buckingham Palace. He turned 100 on 7 December 2010.