Cuban musician Faustino Oramas dies

Cuban musician Faustino Oramas, adored for his saucy ballads and one of the last remaining stars behind the acclaimed Buena Vista Social Club compact disc, died on Tuesday at age 95, Cuban state radio said.

Nicknamed “El Guayabero” after a town that inspired him to write a song after he got into trouble there for flirting with a married woman, Oramas died of liver cancer in a hospital in his home town of Holguin, the radio said.

Often called the king of double-entendres, Oramas composed “Candela” — one of the most rhythmically charged tracks on the 1997 Buena Vista CD. The project brought together the semi-forgotten masters of Cuban “son,” a rootsy and passionate style of traditional music considered the backbone of salsa.

Many of its stars have already died — guitarist Compay Segundo and pianist Ruben Gonzalez in 2003, aged 95 and 84, singer Ibrahim Ferrer in 2005, age 78, and singer-composer Pio Leyva last year at age 88.

Oramas first made his name as a troubadour, wandering from town to town with his guitar and soon became famous for lacing his lyrics with metaphors and sexual innuendo.

Buena Vista Social Club, spearheaded by U.S. guitarist Ry Cooder, and the documentary by Wim Wenders that accompanied it, thrust Cuban son onto the international scene in the late 1990s and the music sold off shelves around the world.

While documents record his birth as in 1911, Oramas was never sure of his exact age. Some say he was as old as 103.

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