Ignacio Villa, known in the artistic world as Bola de Nieve, was an important figure of Cuban music. He stood out as a pianist, composer and unique performer.
 Ignacio Villa, Bola de Nieve, taking into account that this September 11 is the centenary of his birth.
His birth took place in the area of ​​Guanabacoa, in Havana, and since he was a child he had the chance to interact with different personalities since his mother, raised between congos and carabali, used to organize family gatherings in the house that due to their size became parties that they also attended significant figures of culture.
His relationship with music began to materialize in 1921 at the School and Band of Music of Guanabacoa, under the tutelage of the teacher Gerardo Guanche, who provided him with knowledge on solfeggio and theory and also studied at the conservatory of Professor José Mateu.
In fact, he only studied piano some years, since since he was young he had to work to contribute to the family economy.
He then worked as a pianist in the afternoons of the Carral Theater.
In 1927 he enrolled in the Normal school for teachers, but could not continue his studies because of the measures taken by the dictator Gerardo Machado against the student body and the educational centers.
However, the brief passage through the classrooms broadened the horizon of his knowledge and certainly stimulated him in his subsequent search for a cultural formation of remarkable solidity.
The outstanding Cuban actress and singer Rita Montaner was the one who qualified Ignacio Villa as Bola de Nieve.
After having worked with an orchestra, he had become a pianist accompanying the aforementioned singer who was very versatile and jocular.
Precisely in one of her presentations in Mexico, in 1933, when she looked at the oval and shaved head of her pianist and the contrast between her dark skin and the whiteness of her teeth she commented that it looked like a snowball and from then on it would be artistically known simply with that phrase.
Ignacio Villa, Bola de Nieve, reached popularity both in Mexico and in other countries, among them in the United States of America where he also performed together with Rita Montaner.
Bola de Nieve was, in addition to a pianist and composer, an interpreter of indisputable value.
He studied with meticulousness the songs that he would incorporate into his repertoire, and transmitted to him his natural charisma, characterized by originality and mischief. He also interpreted with great success creations of his as Ay, love.
It was presented during several years in the restaurant Monseigneur, from its reopening in 1965.
With his inseparable tails, every night, he offered the diners his art and good humor.
Bola de Nieve died on October 2, 1971. He was in Mexico City on a scale he had made on the trip he made to Peru where he would make a series of presentations.