Adolfo Heraclio Ramos

Adolfo Heraclio Ramos (20 April 1837 — 22 April 1891) was an American pianist, composer, and musician from Puerto Rico.

Life and career

Adolfo Heraclio Ramos was born on 20 April 1837 in Arecibo, Puerto Rico. His father, Don Juan Inés Ramos, was an instrumentalist and music teacher who taught music to Adolfo at a young age. Later, Adolfo trained with a German music professor in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico.

In 1854, at the age of seventeen, Ramos won his first award, placing first at the Puerto Rican Exhibition and Fair in San Juan in 1854.

Ramos was one of the first to introduce the works of Franz Liszt, Frédéric Chopin, Felix Mendelssohn, and Robert Schumann to Puerto Rico. Most of his compositions had a regional character. He was one of the first composers of the danza—a musical genre that originated in Ponce, a city in southern Puerto Rico.

He also composed many chamber music pieces, all in the tradition of the romantic school of classical music. 

Death

Ramos remained active as a music teacher and as an orchestral pianist until his death on 22 April 1891, in Guayama, Puerto Rico. He was 54.