Dominican singer-songwriter Fernando Echavarria died suddenly on the weekend in this capital just prior to going onstage to perform at a concert on a local square, music sources said.
Echavarria, 62, who achieved both local and international fame several decades ago at the head of the La Familia Andre band, collapsed Saturday night in his dressing room and was immediately taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Organizers of the "De dominicana pa'l mundo" concert, at which Echavarria was the key performer, informed the media that he arrived at the venue a few minutes before he needed to go onstage, while Henya & El Laboratorio was playing.
Although the cause of death was not immediately known, some of his friends said on the social networks that the singer succumbed to a heart attack.
Echavarria, who had an architecture degree, is considered to be the father of "fusion," which he defined as a mixture of Afro-Antillan melodies such as samba, cumbia and plena with genres like jazz and rock, overlaid on the basic rhythms of son and merengue.
Among his best-known hits are "Pato robao," "Marcela," "Donde e' que e," "Nande," "Teresa" and "Maria Elena."
In recent years, Echavarria lived and worked in Miami before settling once again in the Dominican Republic, where he gave periodic performances like the one scheduled on the day of his death. EFE





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