had been developed in the late 19th century in Havana and Matanzas. After trovador Sindo Garay settled in Havana in 1906, many other trovadores followed him hoping to obtain a recording contract with one of the American Companies such as RCA Victor and Columbia Records. Those trovadores from different parts of the country met others who already lived in Havana such as María Teresa Vera and Rafael Zequeira. They brought their repertoires of canciones (Cuban songs) and boleros that also included rumbas, guarachas and rural rumbitas. Famous trovador Chico Ibáñez said that he composed his first "montuno" called "Pobre Evaristo" (Poor Evaristo) in 1906: "It was a tonada with three or four words that you put on, and after it, we placed a repeated phrase, the real montuno to be sung by everybody…". Ned Sublette states about another famous trovador and sonero: "As a child, Miguel Matamoros played danzones and sones on his harmonica to entertain the workers at a local cigar factory. He said: 'the sones that were composed at that time were nothing more than two or three words that were repeated all night long. A partial list of trovadores that recorded rumbas, guarachas and sones in Havana at the beginning of the 20th century included: Sindo Garay, Manuel Corona, María Teresa Vera, Alberto Villalón, José Castillo, Juan Cruz, Juan de la Cruz, Nano León, Román Martínez, as well as the duos of Floro and Zorrilla, Pablito and Luna, Zalazar and Oriche, and also Adolfo Colombo, who was not a trovador but a soloist at Teatro Alhambra. In the Havana neighborhoods, the son groups played in any possible format they could gather and most of them were semi-professional. One of those groups, The Apaches, was invited in 1916 to a party held by President Mario Menocal at the exclusive Vedado Tennis Club, and that same year some members of the group were reorganized in a quartet named Cuarteto Oriental. Those members were: Ricardo Martínez from Santiago de Cuba (conductor and tres), Gerardo Martínez (first voice and clave), Guillermo Castillo (botijuela), and Felipe Neri Cabrera (maracas). According to Jesús Blanco, quoted by Díaz Ayala, after a few months from its foundation the bongocero Joaquín Velazco joined the group. In 1917, the Cuarteto Oriental recorded the first son documented on the catalog of Columbia Records which was entered as "Pare motorista-son santiaguero". Unexpectedly, a fifth member of the quartet is