Tribute to a GIANT in the Latin Music Industry and Yankee Fan: Eddie Palmieri

Eddie Palmieri thanking and acknowledging the crowd at a Hispanic Heritage Month event - Image Credit: Eddie Palmieri/Latino Sports Archives

CABO ROJO, PR — As a Nuyorican growing up in the South Bronx since 1956, when my family migrated (not immigrated—since we are U.S. citizens) from Puerto Rico, I have faced many trials and tribulations in securing my cultural identity as a Puerto Rican.

Life in the streets of the South Bronx was far from easy, though as a child I didn’t realize how different it was from life outside the poorest urban congressional district in the nation. I vividly remember being told in public places, “Speak English—you’re in America” whenever I spoke Spanish to my parents, who did not speak English. I remember being chased by Italians because my tan skin revealed I wasn’t Italian, and being chased by Black kids who thought I was Italian because of my lighter complexion.

Our safety zone was essentially our own community, where we navigated the daily challenges of poverty, drugs, gang violence, and frequent police brutality. Under those conditions, finding an outlet was essential for survival. As a teenager, I was fortunate to find two.

One was the Young Lords Party, a street gang turned political advocates for our Puerto Rican community. The other was the birth of a new music genre—neither the Anglo teen hits dominating AM radio (there was no FM yet), nor the old-school music of our parents played on the single Spanish AM station. This was the moment when Eddie Palmieri and his music burst into our lives, giving young Puerto Ricans like me a soundtrack that spoke to both our Nuyorican reality and our Puerto Rican roots.

The first time I heard Eddie Palmieri was at a teen party in 1965. The song was Azúcar— “sugar,” Puerto Rico’s main export. I was 13 years old. The rhythm was electrifying and new. It captured the pulse of New York City streets while weaving in the Puerto Rican culture we were desperate to embrace. I was hooked.

His later albums deepened that connection—Justicia (1969) and especially his groundbreaking 1972 Live at Sing Sing, recorded shortly after the infamous Attica prison riots. The first track featured our brother Felipe Luciano, a founder of the Young Lords and former member of the Last Poets, reciting his poem “Jíbaro, My Pretty Nigger.” In that moment, the word Jíbaro, once dismissed by some as meaning “hillbilly,” was reclaimed as a badge of pride, honoring our island’s rural ancestors.

I collected every album Eddie recorded. Over the years, I had the privilege of meeting him several times. Eddie was down-to-earth, warm, and generous.

My most treasured memory came in 2015, when the New York Yankees invited him to their Hispanic Heritage Month celebration at Yankee Stadium. Eddie was thrilled—it was his first time as a guest at the stadium, and he was a lifelong Yankee fan. Before the scheduled press conference, he was sitting quietly by the dugout, unnoticed. I sat with him, introduced him to the stadium, and began approaching Yankee players to tell them about this music legend in their midst.

Once they learned he was a Grammy Award winner, players came over to shake his hand, congratulate him, sign baseballs, and take photos. The smile on Eddie’s face was pure joy—the same joy any fan feels when meeting the team they’ve loved for a lifetime.

He thanked me that day, but in truth, I was the one grateful—for the chance to share quality time with a musical giant, in the ballpark of the team I had grown up loving.

Eddie Palmieri gave us more than music—he gave us a cultural heartbeat in a city that too often overlooked us. And on that day in Yankee Stadium, I saw the same pride and happiness in him that his music has given to generations of Puerto Ricans.

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