CubaPLUS Magazine

Pianist, bassist, singer, arranger, composer and visual artist, X Alfonso (Havana, 1972) is one of Cuba's great contemporary artistic exponents, for whom love is the main source of inspiration.

As a composer, he has gone through alternative rock and the influence of electronic sounds, passing through ballads with elements of hip hop and pop, with Afro-Cuban roots. His professional career began in 1990 in the legendary group Síntesis, a pioneer in an authentic fusion of Afro-Cuban ritual music with contemporary trends, founded and led by his parents, Carlos Alfonso and Ele Valdés.

Shortly afterwards, without leaving that band, he went his own way, founding the rock and pop-rock group Havana, which left its mark on the alternative music scene of the 1990s, and from 2004 onwards he devoted himself to his personal projects.

With his work, X Alfonso wants to convey to people "all my thoughts, all the conclusions I reach, my messages and practically everything I live", he told this publication, and stressed that "love is what inspires me most".

His musical production has won several awards, including the Latin Grammy Award 2022 in the category of Best Folk Album for Ancestros Sinfónico, his most recent record, made with the participation of his parents and his sister Eme Alfonso.

His creative universe is very broad, in areas such as film, theatre, contemporary dance and audiovisual production, in which he has also received awards, such as the Goya Award (Spain, 2005) for Best Original Music for the film Habana Blues.

A UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, X Alfonso also stands out as a cultural promoter, the result of which is the creation of the Fábrica de Arte Cubano (FAC), an institution that brings together the most diverse genres of contemporary national culture, included by the US magazine Time among the 100 best places in the world in its famous annual guide (2019), and worthy of one of the Travelers' Choice Awards awarded by TripAdvisor, the largest digital travel platform.