“Happy birthday, dear Frank. Lis and I send you a big hug, with great desire to hear you again on your inseparable piano,” the president wrote on his Twitter account, a celebration that was also shared by the National Theater of Cuba.

Born on March 16, 1944, in the town of Mayari, Francisco Fernandez Tamayo (his full name) began playing the piano “by ear” at the age of four and a year later he began to study the instrument with his mother, Altagracia Tamayo, director of the Orbon Academy, in that place in Cuba’s eastern mountains region.

The composer and educator is also considered a leading personality of Cuban piano music and has been described by critics from 34 countries as a world music asset, according to Cuba’s referential website Ecured.

jg/mgt/mml