Cuban jazz bandleaders

Xavier Cugat (January 1, 1900 – October 27, 1990) was a Catalan musician and bandleader who spent his formative years in Havana, Cuba. A trained violinist and arranger, he was a leading figure in the spread of Latin music. In New York City he was the leader of the resident orchestra at the Waldorf–Astoria before and after World War II. He was also a cartoonist and a restaurateur. The personal papers of Xavier Cugat are preserved in the Biblioteca de Catalunya.

Machito (born Francisco Raúl Gutiérrez Grillo, December 3, 1909 – April 15, 1984) was a Latin jazz musician who helped refine Afro-Cuban jazz and create both Cubop and salsa music. He was raised in Havana with the singer Graciela, his foster sister.

Dionisio Ramón Emilio Valdés Amaro (October 9, 1918 – March 22, 2013), better known as Bebo Valdés, was a Cuban pianist, bandleader, composer and arranger. He was a central figure in the golden age of Cuban music, especially due to his big band arrangements and compositions of mambo, chachachá and batanga, a genre he created in 1952. He was the director of the Radio Mil Diez house band and the Tropicana Club orchestra, before forming his own big band, Orquesta Sabor de Cuba, in 1957. However, after the end of the Cuban Revolution, in 1960, Bebo left his family behind and went into exile in Mexico before settling in Sweden, where he remarried. His musical hiatus lasted until 1994, when a collaboration with Paquito D'Rivera brought him back into the music business. By the time of his death in 2013, he had recorded several new albums, earning multiple Grammy Awards. His son Chucho Valdés is also a successful pianist and bandleader.

Paquito D'Rivera (born 4 June 1948) is a Cuban-American saxophonist, clarinetist, and composer who plays and composes jazz and classical music.

Alberto Socarrás Estacio, (Manzanillo, 19 September 1908 – New York City, 26 August 1987), was a Cuban-American flautist who played both Cuban music and jazz.

Cándido de Guerra Camero (22 April 1921 – 7 November 2020), also known simply as Cándido, was a Cuban conga and bongo player. He also plays the tres, drums, and acoustic bass. He has worked in many genres of popular music from pop, rock, R&B and disco to Afro-Cuban dance music and Latin jazz. He is the first player to develop techniques to play multiple conga drums, coordinated independence and the use of multiple percussion, one player playing a variety of percussion instruments simultaneously

Pedro Nolasco Jústiz Rodríguez, better known as Peruchín (January 31, 1913 – December 24, 1977), was a Cuban pianist specializing in jazz-influenced Cuban popular music. He was an important figure in the 1950s descarga (jam session) scene in Havana, and one of the most influential Cuban pianists of the 20th century.