Porfirio Antonio Jiménez Núñez (February 16, 1928 – June 8, 2010) was a Dominican

Dominican Republic

The Dominican Republic is a nation on the island of La Hispaniola, part of the Greater Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean region. The western third of the island is occupied by the nation of Haiti, making Hispaniola one of two Caribbean islands that are shared by two countries...

-born Venezuelan

Venezuelan people

Venezuelan people are from a multiethnic nation in South America called Venezuela. Venezuelans are predominantly Roman Catholic and speak Spanish, and a majority of them are the result of a mixture of Europeans, Africans, and Amerindians.-Demography:...

 Latin music

Latin American music

Latin American music, found within Central and South America, is a series of musical styles and genres that mixes influences from Spanish, African and indigenous sources, that has recently become very famous in the US.-Argentina:...

 composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

, arranger

Arrangement

The American Federation of Musicians defines arranging as "the art of preparing and adapting an already written composition for presentation in other than its original form. An arrangement may include reharmonization, paraphrasing, and/or development of a composition, so that it fully represents...

, and bandleader

Bandleader

A bandleader is the leader of a band of musicians. The term is most commonly, though not exclusively, used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or rock and roll music....

. A native of Hato Mayor Province, he played professionally under the name Porfi Jiménez.

Jiménez' father died when he was three years old, and his mother gave him a trumpet

Trumpet

The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...

 when he turned eight. He began playing the instrument at school in 1940, turning himself into a professional musician two years later.

Jiménez was 26 years old when he arrived in Caracas

Caracas

Caracas , officially Santiago de León de Caracas, is the capital and largest city of Venezuela; natives or residents are known as Caraquenians in English . It is located in the northern part of the country, following the contours of the narrow Caracas Valley on the Venezuelan coastal mountain range...

, the capital city of Venezuela. He started to play with orchestras led by Rafael Minaya, Pedro José Belisario and Chucho Sanoja

Chucho Sanoja

Jesús Chucho Sanoja , was a Venezuelan musician, pianist, composer, music director and arranger.- Early career :...

, as well as for the Billo's Caracas Boys

Billo Frómeta

Billo Frómeta was a Dominican Republic orchestra conductor, arranger and composer who lived and worked most of his life in Venezuela, where he is remembered.- Early career :...

. In the early 1960s, he became noted for his arrangements for bolero

Bolero

Bolero is a form of slow-tempo Latin music and its associated dance and song. There are Spanish and Cuban forms which are both significant and which have separate origins.The term is also used for some art music...

 singers Felipe Pirela and Blanca Rosa Gil. He started his own Latin music dance band in 1963. With lead vocalists Kiko Mendive and Chico Salas, Jimenez' orchestra made its recording debut on the Velvet label. He made several albums for them in the late 1960s and mid 1970s, and helped popularize the salsa

Salsa music

Salsa music is a genre of music, generally defined as a modern style of playing Cuban Son, Son Montuno, and Guaracha with touches from other genres of music...

 rage.

Jiménez enjoyed a huge success in the mid 1980s while recording for Sonografica label, with albums combining salsa, cumbia

Cumbia

Cumbia is a music genre popular across Latin America. The cumbia originated in the Caribbean coast of Colombia, where it is associated with an eponymous dance and has since spread as far as Mexico and Argentina...

, and his native Dominican merengue

Merengue music

Merengue is a type of music and dance from the Dominican Republic. It is popular in the Dominican Republic and all over Latin America. Its name is Spanish, taken from the name of the meringue, a dessert made from whipped egg whites and sugar...

. Some of his most popular songs include La negra Celina, Se hunde el barco, Dolores and Culu Cucú, which reached number one on the Colombia

Colombia

Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

n, Dominican and Venezuelan charts. Beside this, he conducted a 17-piece Jazz orchestra to promote the big band

Big band

A big band is a type of musical ensemble associated with jazz and the Swing Era typically consisting of rhythm, brass, and woodwind instruments totaling approximately twelve to twenty-five musicians...

 tradition by featuring his own repertoire and selected works of Thad Jones

Thad Jones

Thaddeus Joseph Jones was an American jazz trumpeter, composer, and bandleader.-Biography:Thad Jones was born in Pontiac, Michigan to a musical family of ten . Thad Jones was a self taught musician, performing professionally by the age of sixteen...

, Chico O'Farrill

Arturo O'Farrill

Arturo O'Farrill is a pianist, the son of Latin jazz musician and bandleader Chico O'Farrill. He formerly worked with Carla Bley and eventually took over his father's band. Arturo went on to form the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra, which played at Lincoln Center. Under his direction the group recorded...

, among others.

In January 2007 Jiménez was honored in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 by the United Nations Orchestra, created by Dizzy Gillespie

Dizzy Gillespie

John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...

, for his long and storied career in Latin music.

Jiménez died in Caracas at the age of 82 on June 8, 2010.

Sources

 * In Spanish

Spanish language

Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...