El Carrao de Palmarito

Who was El Carrao de Palmarito?

El Carrao de Palmarito, was a Venezuelan llanero singer. He took his stage name from the limpkin, a bird which has a piercing call.

He was born in Palmarito, Apure state to Juan de Mata Laguna and Carmen Cecilia Contreras. He passed his childhood working in a farm near his hometown, and started to sing from very young, performing at the celebrations and parties of Palmarito. In 1955 he moved to live in Barinas. His first performance as a singer was on the radio station Radio Barinas in the program Fiesta Criolla. He acquired the pseudonym El Carrao de Palmarito at the suggestion of Luis Eduardo Camejo, a presenter at the station.

At this city he contracted as singer in the Llano Alto hotel, for during nine months, after this he traveled to Caracas, appearing at the stations Radio Rumbos and Radiodifusora Venezuela. The presenter Alfredo Acuña Zapata coined the nickname Clarín de la Llanura for Contreras. Once successful in the media, he made tours around Venezuela for the promotion of his career. He represented Venezuela in several international events, participating at the film Más Allá Del Orinoco, with the Mexican artist Javier Solís. Also in the Venezuelan production, Agua y Sangre, with the actor Carlos Olivier. In 1965 along with José Romero Bello, he recorded La Leyenda de Florentino y El Diablo based on the poem of Alberto Arvelo Torrealba, with this interpretation Juan de los Santos Contreras consecrated the artist. For 1976 the governments of the states Apure and Portuguesa, made a tribute to him, revealing a bust of the artist at the town of Palmarito.