Those who knew him and tried that it would be impossible to trace his figure without linking it to music assure him. Because Daniel Pérez Vélez was in love with the groups and singers of the sixties and seventies the last century. “A modern of the old days,” says his brother Joaquín. Hence the nickname – which even he himself promoted – with which he was known: ‘Dani 60’. He died on December 8, due to covid, when he was 74 years old.
His family was already well known in Torrelavega because He ran the El Tonel bar for many years, in what is now the so-called wine zone of the city. Later he managed a moving company. However, ‘Dani 60’ took another course. He studied the business module at the old Academia Estudios and, when he came of age, started working at the Peña shoe factory. He had to leave it to join the military service in Africa. Upon his return, after the closure of the shoe factory, he found employment in what was then called Estrada Butano and later Estrada Industrial. However, the work that would define his career was that of Accountant for the builder Joaquín Díaz, in charge of renovating old houses such as the Santillana Foundation and the Jesús de Polanco Foundation, both in Santillana del Mar.
But what ‘Dani 60’ really liked was the music. «He was a true lover. He lived the music of the sixties and seventies like nobody else, “says his brother Víctor, who shares the same hobby, now as a trumpet player in the Municipal Band of Suances. “He, on the other hand, did not play any, although as a young man it is true that he got involved with the drums,” he adds. “At that time, he wore long hair and dressed in colored shirts, bell-bottoms … He attracted a lot of attention,” recalls Joaquín.
‘Musical diamonds’
He was a friend since childhood, as the journalist Nieves Bolado, of José Oyarbide, remembers, a great animator of the sixties musical movements in the capital of Besaya. The latter played music at the well-known Flipper nightclub. This brought them closer together and made them meet other ‘crazy people’ from the 60s and 70s. they created ‘Musical Diamonds’, an association with the aim of collecting and highlighting the music of that time. Together Manolo Teira, Lorenzo Berrazueta, Manuel Quintana and Óscar Pérez, modeled a radio program that first aired on the OID station and now does it every Sunday on Radio Estudio 88. “It was what was delivered from Monday to Saturday. He prepared the records and the songs they were going to put on, he documented himself, he called the singers to talk to them … », says his brother Víctor. With many he became friends. “With Miguel Ríos, for example, they congratulated each other on birthdays,” he adds.
For many years it was one of the promoters of the musical groups of Torrelavega and he also actively collaborated in the organization of concerts, although he never wanted to play the role of promoter. In his house, the keys to the light were covered with album covers from groups like the Rolling Stones or the Beatles. He also collected all the tickets for the many concerts he had attended in Spain and much of abroad. Evenaccompanied Los Zapata for many years, of which he was practically the sixth member although he never wanted to get on stage with them.
His family remembers Daniel Pérez Vélez as “an extraordinary person, who never had a problem with anyone.” By remaining single, he dedicated time, in addition to music, to his nephews. And in summer he never missed his Cádiz appointment in Puerto de Santa María. «In the hotel he was going to, they kept him on the palms. He always brought the employees, whom he already knew as if they were family, sobaos, anchovies, tinned tuna from the north … “, Víctor recalls.
The musical groups of Torrelavega, if the covid pandemic allows it, plan to pay tribute to him, in the form of a great concert, on December 8, which will be the date of their first anniversary. There they will be able to sing him the song by Miguel Ríos in which the Granada-born man affirms that “old rockers never die.”
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