Buena Vista Social Club (Part 1)

One of the first Cuban live bands I ever saw was a concert by the Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club on their farewell world tour at Glasgow Royal Concert Hall. Seeing Omara Portuondo, Guajiro Mirabal, Barbarito Torres and Jesus “Aguaje” Ramos performing live and watching them create the music that I still use in my salsa classes today has been one of the best experiences I have had since I started my salsa journey. After 16 years of touring the world and mesmerising their audience around the globe I was thrilled to get the chance to watch them live before they retired in 2015 and they were nothing short of spectacular. Omara Portuondo’s performance at 84 years is something I will never forget and the ballads extending across most of what Afro-Cuban music has to offer was a delight to hear from this 12 piece band despite the fact that only few of the original band members were performing at the farewell tour.

Some of the songs made famous by Buena Vista Social Club have become instantly recognisable around the world even among non-dancers and people who have no particular interest in Cuban culture. They were among the first songs I recognised in my initial salsa classes and I continue to listen to them today despite the fact that they have been somewhat overplayed on occasion.

The name “Buena Vista Social Club” has become a brand that encompasses a number of things and it is confusing for most people to know what exactly it is that the term is referring to. Originally, the term described a member-only club in Havana with membership being determined by ethnicity in style of a Cabildo (African ethnic associations in Cuba that declined in the 19th century). Later on, the name became associated with a band (Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club), a documentary by Wim Wenders, an album released by the label World Circuit Records and the name of a song on that album written by Orestes López Valdés. There is also a famous CD called “A Buena Vista – Barrio de la Habana” by the Soneros de Verdad which is led by Luis Frank Arias Mosquera who had close ties to the Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club being himself a former member and went on to record some of his greatest hits with another one of the Orquesta’s musicians Pío Leyva. This CD contains one of Luis Frank’s greatest hits confusingly called “A Buena Vista” to add another similar sounding song name to the list and many other songs exist that have used the term in their lyrics or titles making it very difficult to determine the boundaries of this brand name.

A musical named “The Bar at Buena Vista”, has become a worldwide success in recent years and has added to the hype surrounding this brand featuring Cuban stars like Siomara Avilla Valdes Lescay and Maestro Rubalcaba, known in Cuba as “The Hands of Gold”.

Guantanamera (Part 2)

The lyrics of the song Guantanamera based on José Martí’s poem as well as their English translation are as follows:

Yo soy un hombre sincero	I am a sincere man
De donde crece la palma	From where the palm tree grows
Y antes de morirme quiero	And before I die I want
Echar mis versos del alma	To let out the verses of my soul
Mi verso es de un verde claro	My verse is light green
Y de un carmín encendido	And it is flaming red
Mi verso es un ciervo herido	My verse is a wounded stag
Que busca en el monte amparo	Seeking refuge on the mountain
Cultivo una rosa blanca	I grow a white rose
En julio como en enero	In July just as in January
Para el amigo sincero	For the honest friend
Que me da su mano franca	Who gives me his open hand
Con los pobres de la tierra	With the poor people of the earth
Quiero yo mi suerte echar	I want to cast my lot
El arroyo de la sierra	The brook of the mountains
Me complace más que el mar	Gives me more pleasure than the sea

While the song is generally accepted to be patriotic in nature many opinions have been formed as to the meaning the lyrics are trying to convey.

In the first verse Cuba patriotism is introduced as we learn that it is about an honest dying man from Cuba – “the land where the palm trees grow”.

The "light green" part in the second verse is usually believed to signify Cuba’s nature while the "flaming red" may be interpreted as the red equilateral triangle of the Cuban flag which itself stands for blood and courage. The "wounded stag" is taken to be a symbol of Christ. Thus, the second verse shows that the narrator adheres to Christianity, Cuba’s prevailing religion.

The white rose in the third verse represents love and the purity of friendship as well as the narrator's appreciation of true friendship. The poem from Marti that this verse is based on “Cultivo Una Rosa Blanca” is one of his most famous poems and usually the first poem learned by school children in Latin America.

In the final verse, we learn that the protagonist wants to cast his lot “with the poor people of the earth”, and that he gains more pleasure from the simple wealth of "the brook of the mountains" than from the immense wealth of "the sea." It is this verse that has given the song a more global reputation amongst social equality movements.

Guantanamera (Part 1)

Guantanamera is the title of probably the best known Cuban song and one of the most well-known Spanish songs around the world. The title can be translated as “Woman from Guantánamo” and the most common version is based on a poem by the famous Cuban poet José Martí. Julián Orbón adapted selections from Martí’s famous poetry collection “Versos Sencillos” (Simple Verses) into four verses which have become known as the “official” lyrics.

The music itself is attributed to Joseíto Fernández although there is some dispute over when and who first invented the song. However, when Herminio García Wilson's heirs took the matter to court to argue that Wilson was responsible for the song’s structure, they lost the case at the People's Supreme Court of Cuba making Joseíto Fernández the officially accepted composer of the song. Moreover, Fernández, who is believed to have created the song in 1929, changed the lyrics of the song regularly in a radio show that he was running to comment on daily events making the music popular in the Spanish speaking world.

The song has become a national and international hit being adapted by many artists such as Celia Cruz, Julio Iglesias, Trini Lopez, La Lupe, Buena Vista Social Club and Tito Puente. Pete Seeger recorded a reworked version of the song based on Orbón’s lyrics which significantly aided in the song’s rise to international fame especially when the group The Sandpipers adapted the song a few years later. In 1966 their version had become the most commercially successful adaptation reaching No. 7 on the UK singles chart.

Different lyrics by various authors have been used over time which all have a separate origin story. Garcia said that he made a pass at a girl in the street and she reacted rather harshly, embarrassing him in front of his friends, after which he wrote a song about the incident. Fernández claimed that the song was about a woman he was interested in romantically but who only had a platonic interest in him. The official lyrics based on Marti's poetry collection Versos Sencillos, talk about a Cuban man who wants to share the way he feels with the world setting the scene for a patriotic hymn about Cuba, class equality and freedom for the poor.