El Gran Varón
Willie Colón · 1989 · written by Omar Alfanno, from the album Top Secrets
Simón was raised to be a real man like his father. She grows up to be a woman, and her father never speaks to her again: one of salsa's saddest stories.
The story
1.A son is born
In a hospital, at 9:43 in the summer of 1956, Simón is born, and his father, Andrés, is proud: it's a boy.
He's raised with a heavy hand, never asked his opinion, and told his future: he'll study what his father studied, and he'll be a great man.
2.Far from home
Simón moves abroad, and far from home the sermon fades. She changes the way she walks, and starts wearing skirts, lipstick and a big purse.
3.The visit
One day her father visits without warning. A woman greets him on the street: hi, dad, don't you recognize me? I'm Simón, your son, the great man.
Andrés listens to what people say, and never speaks to his child again.
4.The phone call
Years go by. The old man softens a little, but Simón has stopped writing. Then comes the call Andrés never forgets: in a hospital, in the summer of 1986, Simón has died of a strange disease, at thirty. Nobody cries for the patient in bed 10.
5.The lesson
The montuno turns to the listener: enough moralizing, have compassion. Whoever never forgives is left with bitter memories, in a hell of their own.
Key phrases
- “Tendrás que ser un gran varón”You'll have to be a great manVarón means male, and un gran varón is a real man, the kind a proud father wants his son to be. The title turns it into an irony, and an accusation.
- “Palo que nace doblado jamás su tronco endereza”A tree that grows up crooked never straightens its trunkAn old proverb, and the chorus: you can't change someone's nature. People have heard it two ways ever since, as “let her be who she is” and as a judgment. The song's last lines lean toward the first.
- “Si del cielo te caen limones”If life hands you lemons, learn to make lemonadeThe coro's advice to the father, Andrés: stop complaining and accept it.
- “De una extraña enfermedad”Of a strange diseaseThe song never names AIDS. In 1989, it didn't need to.
- “Hay que tener compasión”You have to have compassionWhere the song ends up, along with “let whoever is without sin cast the first stone”.
Context
The Panamanian songwriter Omar Alfanno wrote it in 1986, and said it was based on a friend of his from his teenage years. Willie Colón recorded it for Top Secrets (Fania, 1989), with an arrangement by Isidro Infante.
It was the B-side of another single, and many radio stations refused to play it, but it became a hit anyway, one of Colón's biggest. Billboard put it at number 23 on its list of the greatest Latin songs of all time.
It's often called the first song in Spanish about AIDS, and it's argued about to this day: some hear an anthem of acceptance, others hear the prejudice of its time in its chorus. Either way, it asked a whole continent of dance floors to think about a father who couldn't love his child as she was.
On the dance floor
A long song, around seven minutes, at a steady mid tempo. The story takes up the first half: dance it smooth and simple, and listen.
Then the coro repeats its proverb and Colón answers with a new line each round, growing from judgment to compassion. The energy builds all the way to the end.
This is our own retelling of the song, not its lyrics or a translation of them: the few short phrases quoted are there to explain what they mean. The song belongs to its writer, Omar Alfanno.