Nelson de la Olla — Nelson Mendoza Batista, born in 1969 in La Ceiba, Bonao — is a Dominican merengue singer, arranger and composer. He founded La Banda Chula in 1996 and has led it since, working a comic register that most merengue orchestras do not attempt.

Early years and formation

He is from La Ceiba, in Monseñor Nouel, the son of Ana Julia Batista and Horacio Mendoza. He began studying music at fifteen and played his way through the main groups of Bonao before leading anything of his own.

The training shows in what he does now. He arranges and composes as well as fronting, which is why the band sounds arranged rather than assembled.

La Banda Chula

He put the band together in 1996 and it carried him well past the Dominican circuit. The style is chercha — jokes, double meanings, a song built around a punchline — and it is a harder thing to sustain than a romantic register, because the joke has to land every time.

He performs in a Mexican charro outfit, which has nothing to do with the music and everything to do with the act. Si Tu Boquita Fuera, Yo Como Que Te He Visto, Los Pastores and El Vape are among the records.

The company

Dominican press files him with the comic and street end of merengue rather than the orchestral end, in the company of Tulile and that generation, and he has told stories about Toño Rosario from the years coming up.

He is still recording. Yo Como Que Te He Visto went out again as a live re-recording, and new material has kept arriving through 2026.