Despite being born into an extremely musical family and having learned to read music and play the majority of percussion instruments when I was little, I never wanted to be a musician or be associated with the world of entertainment.
A day like any other long ago, I was walking to school in my starched uniform holding my grandmother’s hand, and she asked me to not become an artist. I never asked her why, and for a child of barely 9 a grandmother’s advice is practically law – at least for me it was. "Study a lot, my son, and become a doctor like your grandfather". My grandfather, Doctor Leoncio Morua, the pride of the entire family and director of the local polyclinic, always dreamed that one of his seven children, three girls and four boys, would go on to become a doctor. My uncle, Luis Morua, abandoned his medical studies to go on tour with a group of university students, and the other children also opted for music, including my mother, "Monica Leticia" (stage name).
Following the request of my dear grandmother, I left the drumsticks for the stethoscope and white coat of my grandfather. I was student assistant of biology and felt the pulse of some drowsy lizards, but that was it…
Many years have passed and I am a promoter rather than a doctor and although my promotion ventures are diverse, it has been my involvement with the world of musical and artistic entertainment that has shaped my career.
I have spent 15 years immersed in the promotion and production of Cuban art: a film, two documentaries, twelve musical productions (two of them with five Latin Grammy nominations) and thirty two tours of great artists from the Island in the United States, are the result of the work of our company, Fuego Entertainment.
OnCuba is our new proposal, with the purpose of promoting all those things that unite us as Cubans and that I consider we have the obligation to nurture and encourage.
A long time has passed since that talk with my grandmother. I would like to think that even though I did not fulfill her wish, she feels proud of me. Because promoting our culture, caring for and defending it is, somehow, practicing medicine for the soul.
This is still our pledge, now from the pages of OnCuba.
HUGO CANCIO
Publisher & President
Fuego Media Group, Inc
