Τετάρτη, Μαΐου 25, 2016

ΑΠΟΧΑΙΡΕΤΙΣΜΟΣ ΣΤΑ ΟΠΛΑ ΓΙΑ ΕΝΑ ΘΡΥΛΙΚΟ ΣΥΓΚΡΟΤΗΜΑ

 

* Ο κύκλος έκλεισε: Η τουρνέ αποχαιρετισμού των Buena Vista Social Club

www.amna.gr

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A Havana Farewell to the Buena Vista Social Club




HAVANA — “The revolution is invincible,” say the painted walls along the streets of Havana, as if they could banish doubt through the act of insisting, in red block letters.
But what really is invincible in Cuba is Omara Portuondo, the 85-year-old diva of the Buena Vista Social Club, in a red dress, vamping and shimmying on a stage, showing a roaring audience that fading and dying are of no interest to her.
She is the same singer whose face stares out in torchy glamour on the tattered, Batista-era LPs sold to tourists on the Plaza de Armas in Havana. She is still here, still able to get an entire theater to leap to its feet and sing with her, to “Besame Mucho” and “Quizas, Quizas, Quizas,” with a simple wave of her arms.
Ms. Portuondo, a legend to Cubans, was an original member of the recording phenomenon known as the Buena Vista Social Club. For the last two years she and her surviving bandmates Barbarito Torres, Eliades Ochoa and Guajiro Mirabal have been touring with a new version of the old group, called Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club. They called it the “Adiós Tour,” and it ended on Saturday and Sunday night at the Teatro Karl Marx in Havana.
The band members were already old two decades ago, when the outside world first discovered them, which is part of what made the project so amazing. Time and memory seemed to have eclipsed the musicians when Ry Cooder and a British music producer, Nick Gold, brought them together in 1996 to make a record. That collection of antique Cuban dance music of the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, made by a makeshift group of musicians from across the island, was so popular it led to a world tour, some Grammys, a Carnegie Hall concert, a film, then spinoff records and spinoff tours: a phenomenon far easier to savor than to explain.
At the Karl Marx concerts, scrapbook images of the departed Club members were shown on a screen behind the musicians, lending a spirit of sweet sadness to the evening. But the living headliners, with accompanists young enough to be their grandchildren, showed how death can be made irrelevant where music is concerned.



Still, it was hard to escape a sense of imminent loss. The same might be said of the country for which the Buena Vista Social Club has become an important cultural export. In the era of President Obama and Raúl Castro, warming relations have brought new concerns. When the Americans descend, when the cruise ships seize Havana Harbor, when decades of hostility are replaced by a warm embrace, then what? Never mind the strain on infrastructure, how might the new tourist onslaught affect Cuba’s soul?
No one else can speak for Cubans, but I imagine many would say their national soul will be just fine, not least because of the pulsing health of their music. The abundance of hipsters and young parents and children dancing in the aisles at the Teatro Karl Marx made it clear: The Buena Vista Social Club is not exactly an oldies act.
If you go as a tourist to Havana, you may hear that they perform Tuesdays and Saturdays at this hotel, or every night at 9:30 at that supper club. But don’t be fooled. Music of all kinds pours from the streets in Havana, but the Buena Vista Social Club is no more.
Saturday’s concert was the first in Cuba in many years by core members of the group. Sunday’s was to be the last. Any future hello-goodbyes will have to fit the musicians’ schedules. Ms. Portuondo, for one, is going out on tour again this summer.

Buena Vista Social Club Return Home for Historic Cuba Show .

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*Buena Vista Social Club - Βικιπαίδεια

 1. Bruca Maniguá 00:00
2. Herido de Sombras 04:44
3. Marieta 08:55
4. Guateque Campesino 14:50
5. Mami Me Gustó 19:59
6. Nuestra Última Cita 25:04
7. Cienfuegos Tiene Su Guaguancó 29:01
8. Silencio 34:24
9. Aquellos Ojos Verdes 39:03
10. Qué Bueno Baila Usted 43:57
11. Como Fue 48:36


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