Eusebio Santiago Azpiazu (1981-1966) adopted the name Mario Antobal for business reasons. He was the brother of famed bandleader Don Azpiazu (Justo Angel Azpiazu). Both men were from a well-off Cuban family of Basque Heritage. Mario made his fortune in sugar, real estate and stocks before involving himself in music when he met and married former Ziegfeld girl Marion Sunshine.
She was a canny songwriter, and once Mario’s brother formed a band, she started writing songs for him. Mario in turn, managed the career of his brother Don Azpiazu, organizing tours, publicity, and setting up the publishing companies Pan-American Music and later Antobal Music.

Marion also helped translate the smash hit El Manisero (The Peanut Vendor), which could be heard that historic April afternoon in 1930, at the RKO Palace Theatre in New York City, when Don Azpiazu and his Havana Casino Orchestra first introduced their authentic Cuban Rhythms to the world outside their homeland! And when they recorded their version of El Manisero, they lit a Latin American-influenced fuse that began an enormous fad in the 1930s.

Don Azpiazu’s band eventually broke up, and Mario decided to start a band of his own, Antobal’s Cubans. Drawing from some of the musicians who played with his brother, his band included some of the hottest Latin session men in New York at the time, among them flutist Alberto Socarrás. Antobal’s Cubans became a highly successful dance orchestra during the Great Depression (1932-1937).

Marion continued to write and translate, this time for her husband, who continued to publish music throughout his life. He was devoted to her, and admired her many talents. In tribute, he established in her name a scholarship at the Juilliard School of Music.

In 1959, in order to promote some of the best compositions of his own publishing company, Antobal began to produce a series of orchestral albums featuring the best Cuban musicians, an All-Star band under the direction of Obdulio Morales, the world-renowned composer of Enlloró (Voodoo Moon), Sube espuma (Washerwoman), Mambo in E and many others. He was also the creator of an intriguing and captivating new dance rhythm from the Island that had already given us the Rumba, the Conga, the Mambo and the Cha-Cha-Cha. It was the Bembó, which differed radically from its predecessors in that it is played in six-eight time.

Morales also contributed as arranger, but so did Chico O’Farrill, Peruchín, Gilberto Valdés, and René Hernández—the best in the field. The orchestra, made up of the best soloists in the island, handled their excellent arrangements in an exciting fashion. Don Azpiazu’s youngest, Raul Azpiazu, handled the vocals along with Gina Martin, one of Cuba’s most colorful and outstanding vedettes, on the album “Ay Caramba!”, while Roberto Cordero is featured on the other three albums, “Agua! Agua!”, “Día de Reyes” and “Mango Mangué.” These recordings bring us the best of the dance rhythms of Havana with the big band sound of Antobal’s All-Stars!

—Jordi Pujol (From the inside liner notes of BMCD 898)