Pedro Ramaya Beltran

Folk musician Pedro Ramayá Beltrán is a living teacher of the millo flute and the gaita, and is regarded as the founder of Soledad's modern cumbia sound. In 1930, he was in the Corregimiento of Patico, Talaigua la Nueva. He learned to play flute at age eight while growing up on his family farm. He led his first groups in his teens, and developed his technique further during a long career in the armed forces. Upon retirement, he began to teach and record individual songs and became a sideman and composer/arranger with many Colombian artists. Though he began recording as early a...