MUSIC-CUBA: Two Grammy’s for the Cradle of Sound

By Dalia Acosta Reprint | | Print |

Dalia Acosta

HAVANA, Mar 3 1998 (IPS) - Cuban musicians and fans alike have been rejoicing over the triumph of local stars at the U.S. Grammy Awards this year,.

The Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences chose two Cuban records “Buenavista Social Club” and “Havana,” as the winner of categories for tropical music and Latin jazz.

“We won, Chucho, we won,” were the first words of US trumpeter, Roy Hardgrove, who, along with the Cuban pianist Chucho Valdes, created the group Crisol last year, in creating “Havana.”

The awards ceremony was barely over early Feb 26 when Hardgrove rang Valdes – considered the grand master of Cuban jazz – to tell him “The miracle has happened.”

The news reached other members of Crisol in various countries of the world, Jose Luis Quintana (Changuito) was here in Havana, Miguel Diaz (Anga) in Paris and Horacio Fernandez (El Negro) was in Los Angeles.

The prizes have a special meaning for Cuba due to the limitations of the U.S. economic embargo which has blocked direct access of Cuban music and musicians to the American market for nearly 40 years.

“Winning the Grammy is the culmination of an extraordinary year,” said Valdes who in 1978, along with his band Iraquere, became the first Cuban to win the coverted prize.

This year the Cuban traditonalist performeer Albita Rodriguez traditional rhythms, also figured among the Grammy contentenders. She emigrated to the United States in 1993 after a long period in Bogota.

But beyond the recognition of the music of Cuba, behind the prizes, there is a clear tendency, unprecedented in the last four decades, of rapprochement between artists living on the island and in the United States.

The interest of the US record companies in what is happening on the island flourished in late 1996, when representatives of seven of them travelled to the island, with the authorisation of the US State Department.

The possibility of music becoming a real vehicle for understanding between the two countries, above and beyond State politics, emerged strongly two years ago with the presentation of the film “I Am, from Son to Salsa.”

Directed and written by two Cubans, Rigoberto Lopez and Leonardo Padura, both resident in Havana, and produced by the US citizen Ralph Mercado, the feature-length film tells the history of the salsa in New York, from its origin in Cuba.

At the same time, there are definite signs of a search for a market for the traditional son, in place of the salsa, and for musicians who up until very recently were only recorded in Cuba, by very knowlegeable critics and their closest friends.

This is the feeling given by the prize for “Buenavista Social Club,” one of the three records of Cuban popular music produced last year by Roy Cooder, general producer and manager of the British label World Circuit.

“A record rarely gets the approval of the most demanding critics and achieves such a volume of sales among such a variety of listeners,” said critic Pedro de la Hoz writing in the official Communist Party daily ‘Granma.’ The “Buenavista Social Club” sold successfully in the United States, Britain, Spain, Greece, Italy, France and Sweden.

The record brings together figures like Francisto Repilado, an octogenarian rescued from oblivion in 1995 and taken to the height of fame with the album “Antologia de Compay Segundo,” produced in Spain by the Warner Music company.

Ruben Gonzalez also figures, one of the best popular pianists in Cuba, who after recording a little sold record in 1975 reappeared at the age of 80 with “Introducing Ruben Gonzalez,” one of the World Circuit productions.

Juan Formell, director of the Van Van band, one of the leading groups of the last 25 years in Cuba, recognised the room given to the old son artists by the record companies as an act of justice.

He also said it was possible some marketing manoevre could turn this situation around, at a time when the Cuban popular bands start to push out their main competitors in the salsa world – Porto Rico and the Dominican Republic.

Formell spoke on Cuban television days before the Grammy prizes were awarded to announce his group’s tour of the United Staes following a successful concert in New York – the Mecca of salsa – last year.