Perez Prado Mambo Mambo (CD)

The son of a newspaperman and a schoolteacher, Damaso Perez Prado was born in 1916, and left Cuba for Mexico City in the 1940s, before moving to the U.S. to capitalize on his RCA success and the Latin craze of the '50s. His 1955 instrumental cha-cha ofCherry Pink And Apple Blossom Whitespent weeks at the top of the charts. Among his chart-topping recording successes were his compositionsMambo No. 5(re-popularized by Lou Bega's number-one sampled cover in 1999),Mambo No. 8, andPatricia.