Goodbye Pedrito Altamiranda!

On Thursday, March 7, the death of Panamanian singer and songwriter Pedro Altamiranda Félez, known as Pedrito Altamiranda, was announced.

The philologist and publicist died at home, surrounded by the love of his family. He was 88 years old.

Singer-songwriter

Pedro Altamiranda Félez was born in 1935 and became known for his role as a singer-songwriter, with lyrics inspired by Panamanian music, live music and, of course, political events.

Since 1979, he has been inspired social and political problems of Panama and made his opinions known in the form of poems.

In 2004, a intestinal complication This forced him to distance himself from the stage, but he still remained relevant and gave sporadic performances and presentations during the following years.

Some of his political songs were so controversial that they were censored by various governments, including that of Manuel Antonio Noriega.

In 1984, the song ‘Lessons’ was censored because it talked about the election theft of that year. In 1990, the album “Radio Focop” was released, on which he made fun of the humiliation of the military regime and its 21-year dictatorship, and the song dedicated to the civilist crusade “Not one more day”.

In February 2004, a week before Carnival, he published a song called “La Doña”, a satire of President Miriam Moscoso, also very controversial due to its direct critical content towards the government of the Republic.

Most of their songs are influenced by calypso, salsa and carnival wind and percussion instruments known as murgas, providing a uniquely Panamanian style.

The last songs Pedro composed were ‘3,000,000’, ‘Bad band’ and ‘La Murciamanía’, mockery and harsh criticism of the PRD.

In 2010, he played again with a new song, this time dedicated to the mayor of the capital, Bosco Ricardo Vallarino. It is about the topic “Pischinas”, which refers to the mayor’s idea of ​​buying inflatable pools from China.