Daily Dose Of Jazz…

Hernán Oliva was born in Valparaíso, Chile on July 4, 1913 and began his violin studies at age 8 under a dominating mother. Around 1927 at the age of fourteen, he joined the Ernesto Davagnino Orchestra. Bohemian in character and dedicating himself to music over his father choice of law, his father disinherited and expelled from the home.

Around 1935 he crossed to Mendoza, Argentina and worked a few months on the LV10 radio in Cuyo, with his orchestra. Migrating to Buenos Aires, Argentina where Luis Davagnino, Ernesto’s brother, also a musician, lived, and after finding him whistling from corner to corner of Calle Alsina a tune that he knew Luis would recognize received him at his home after. Getting him a job as a companion to Betty Caruso and Fanny Loy on Radio Belgrano, then joined the René Cóspito Orchestra.

He played at the Boite La Chaumiere, with Enrique “Mono” Villegas on piano, David Washington on trumpet, and the English Phillips on sax. The following year Hernán joined the Oscar Alemán orchestra and by 1944 he began working with Ahmed Ratip’s Cotton Pickers, then with Tito Alberti and José Finkel they formed the Jazz Casino in 1951 with singer Lorna Warren.

His later years were spent hanging around the bars of San Telmo playing for whoever asked, sometimes for a glass of whiskey and for many who never appreciated his enormous talent. Violinist Hernán Oliva, who recorded six albums as a leader, passed away in the early morning of June 17, 1988 in Buenos Aires, Argentina lying on a sidewalk in the Palermo neighborhood, hugging his violin case.

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