New York University professor was writing Eddie Palmieri biography.
Juan Flores, a professor and writer whose work often explored music’s role in Latino identity, has died. The 71-year-old author of books such as From Bomba to Hip-Hop, Flores had reportedly been working on a biography of Puerto Rican pianist and bandleader Eddie Palmieri.
“His strongest work became the ethnographic unearthing of blackness in Latin music,” author and music critic Ed Morales wrote in an appreciation of Flores on his website. “From bomba to hip-hop, from bugalú to maracatú.”
Morales called Flores “a kid from Queens who loved to bugalú.”