Benjo Cruz

Benjamín Cordeiro Ponce (1942-1970), also known as "Benjo Cruz", was born in La Paz, Bolivia in January 1942. He was a musician, poet and combatant of the Teoponte guerrilla in Bolivia. He was originally destined to become a doctor after studying in La Plata, Argentina but later got to making music after getting married. At twenty-eight, he was known as Benjo Cruz (artistic name) or "Casiano" (fighter name), joined the Guerrilla of Teoponte and began his career as a musician, his songs acquired social content. The popular Bolivian singer-songwriter and fighter continued in Teoponte the fight of Che Guevara with a group of young people who traveled as literacy teachers and was killed by the Bolivian army in 1970. source: (M. Sánchez Patzy, 2006)