San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
René and René helped Tejano go mainstream
I was reminiscing last week about some of my early clients after graduating from Baylor Law School in 1968 and remembered a client named Abe Epstein. He represented several artists in the music industry. His most famous clients at the time were a duo called René and René. Mr. Epstein hired me to sue the two Renés for breach of contract. They had a moneymaking record out, and he claimed he wasn’t being paid his agent commission.
The Renés were represented by a very fine gentleman-lawyer, Albert McNeel. Along the way, there was a dispute with one of the Renés over whether he had to take off his sunglasses during his oral deposition. You and your readers may not remember this singing group, but at the time they were rather iconic in South Texas. Your readers might enjoy learning more about Abe and his clients.
Robert Allen
Bilingual artists René Ornelas and René Herrera were known as either “René and René” or “René y René,” depending on their expected audience. The duo had hits that reached the Billboard Hot 100. They appeared on national television and shared bills with superstars such as the Beach Boys and José Feliciano.
The personable, clean-cut young men — check out their “American Bandstand” spot on YouTube — weren’t an overnight sensation. They worked more than a decade as professional entertainers before they scored their first hit, “Angelito”/ ”Little Angel,” in 1964. The original Renés were René Herrera (1935-2005) and René Ornelas (1936 to present), both of Laredo.
Ornelas was the son of Miguel “Mike” Ornelas (19121983), an orchestra leader who toured the West Coast, Southwest and Midwest and recorded on McAllen’s Falcon label. At
14, the younger Ornelas played trumpet and sang with his father’s “Orquestra” but soon went out on his own.
Ornelas and Herrera joined Juan Garza Gongora, Juan Orfila and José Luis Quesada to form the Casa Blanca Quintet in 1952. A year later, minus Quesada, they were the Quarter Notes, says Ramon Hernandez, author of a forthcoming book, “René and René: The Originators of Bilingual Pop Songs.” The Renés “grew up on vocal
groups like the Ink Spots,” the biographer said. After the Quarter Notes split up in 1962, Ornelas and Herrera decided to continue as René and René, with Ornelas singing lead and Herrera on harmony.
Asked to describe their style, Hernandez called it “international pop.” René and René were contemporaries of Little Joe and Sunny (Ozuna) and the Sunliners, but they were different from most Tejano acts of their time. They “didn’t perform any rancheras or cumbias,” Hernandez said, referring to the folk songs and rhythms characteristic of traditional Tejano music.
Legal dispute
Both Renés were talented songwriters, and that helped the pair take off. Although they had hits with some covers, such as their 1965 redo of the Big Bopper’s “Chantilly Lace,” the songs that boosted René and René to national fame were originals. Herrera counts three of their crossover, dual-language songs — “Angelito”/”Little Angel,” “Lo Mucho Que te Quiero”/“The More I Love You” and “Baby Doll” — as their greatest hits, along with “Hoy Amaneci Pensando En Ti”/ “Let’s Turn Out The Lights” and a few others. They’re slowdance, “our-song” tunes with sweet lyrics that move smoothly between Spanish and English … and local businessman Abe Epstein had something to do with that.
A real-estate agent and music
producer, “Abie” Epstein “helped create and publicize
San Antonio’s fabled West Side Sound, a blend of doo-wop, R&B, soul music and rock ’n’ roll characterized by heavy reverb vocals and harmonies, triplets and combo organ,” according to his Express-News obituary, written by Hector Saldaña and published April 13, 2012.
When the Renés brought their song, “Angelito,” to Epstein’s studio at 735 N. General McMullen Drive, he suggested they add some English lyrics. Epstein later recalled that Herrera wanted to sell the song for $100. Epstein told an interviewer that he talked Herrera out of it, and the record sold 30,000 copies in less than a month.
According to the discography Hernandez compiled for his book, the recording of “Angelito” released on Epstein’s JOX label was the first of several versions with different B sides, countries of origin (hello, Belgium!) and labels. The one issued by Columbia Records is probably the most significant. It’s dated April 24, 1964; on Aug. 8 of that year, the dapper Renés were crooning their bilingual hit on “Bandstand” and getting interviewed by host Dick Clark.
As for the lawsuit between Epstein and the Renés, a San Antonio Light story from Jan. 16, 1969, says Epstein filed it against the singers and their manager, Mel Lance, a former employee of Epstein Enterprises, asking for $75,000 in damages. “The plaintiff contends
the recording artists signed a contract with him Jan. 18, 1964, which included a provision that they would not record songs with other firms for a five-year period. René & René recorded ‘Angelito’ for Epstein but later (in 1968) recorded it … for Falcon Records,” an alleged breach of contract.
The Express story on the lawsuit reports that Epstein requested an accounting and asked for punitive damages of $25,000 from Lance, $50,000 from Falcon Records and a percentage of the income earned by Herrera and Ornelas. There is no further coverage of the case in either San Antonio daily newspaper. Biographer Hernandez, who has interviewed Ornelas extensively, didn’t know the outcome of the suit. He asked the surviving René for his recollection, which was that it was settled out of court with no damages paid.
Other Renés
Hernandez asked Ornelas if he or Herrera was asked to remove their sunglasses during their depositions. I heard the recorded answer: “I don’t remember that.” (Shades were not a big part of their look — Hernandez can remember only one album cover on which a René is wearing sunglasses.)
René and René had one more big national hit, “Lo Mucho
Que Te Quiero,” that made hit-parade lists all over the country in 1968, going up against songs by the Beatles, Petula Clark, Sammy Davis Jr., the Doors, Aretha Franklin, Martha & the Vandellas, Smokey Robinson, the Who and Stevie Wonder. By then, they were recording for White Whale, “the same label as the Turtles,” Hernandez said, and they toured as much as they wanted to, including in Asia, Australia and Europe.
It was too much for René Herrera, who quit in 1972. “He wanted to earn a college degree and become a banker,” Hernandez said. He fulfilled those goals and then some, according to his obituary: “A graduate of Texas A&I University at Laredo, Herrera worked with the city of Laredo, Union National Bank and the Laredo Independent School District.”
Ornelas “had to look for another René,” Hernandez said. He recruited talented musicians who technically weren’t Renés but were the right age and had the right skills. They included Tejano musicians Jorge Ramirez, Marvin Palacios and several others who balanced their time as Renés with other projects and who moved on when new opportunities arose.
“There were a whole bunch of Renés,” Hernandez said. Then, in the mid-1980s, Ornelas changed the act’s name to René René, “like Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam.” Just as Lisa Velez was one Lisa with other bandmates, René Ornelas became a single René with collaborators, including, for a time, the legendary conjunto accordionist Esteban “Steve” Jordan.
Over the years, the Renés’ songs were covered by artists as diverse as Vikki Carr, Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, trumpeter Al Hirt, Trini Lopez and the Royal Jesters.
Ornelas continued performing as René René into the 1990s and later joined a Christianmusic ensemble, Tejanos for Christ, with Ozuna, Patsy Torres and Rudy Gonzalez of Rudy & the Reno Bops. Ornelas still appears on the Tejano oldies circuit. “People say, “Oh, pobrecito, he’s 86, he’s still working,’ ” said Hernandez, 81. “They fly him out to California, put him up in a nice hotel. He does three songs. They have an orchestra there to back them up. He does two shows on weekends, and they pay him $3,000.”
Hernandez’s self-published book on René y René/René René will be published in about three months. Watch this column for ordering information.