According to conventional wisdom, the sensational success of “The Buena Vista Social Club” CD and film–as well the general resurgence of interest in Cuban music–is to a large degree the handiwork of American guitarist Ry Cooder.
The story goes that Cooder ventured to Havana in 1996, rounded up musicians who had been forgotten even by the Cuban public and recorded them, thereby resuscitating careers and sparking renewed interest in Cuban musical culture in the U.S. and around the world.
Cooder indeed took part in “The Buena Vista Social Club” recording dates but, alas, a bit too much credit may have been showered upon him. For without the efforts of Juan de Marcos Gonzalez, a native Cuban musician who has been championing indigenous sounds at least since the 1970s, Cooder might still be in Havana trying to dig up phone numbers for such faded stars as nonagenarian singer-guitarist Compay Segundo and octogenarian pianist Ruben Gonzalez.
Though Cooder played an important role in establishing the link between Cuban artists and the American record industry, the musical architect of “The Buena Vista Social Club” and several subsequent recordings was Gonzalez, a fact widely known within the world of Cuban music but barely acknowledged outside of it.
“Yes, it is a little sad that people don’t always know what I did, but it’s much more important that the music of our culture is heard,” says Gonzalez, who will lead his Afro-Cuban All Stars in concert Thursday at the Chicago Theatre.
“For some people, maybe it’s comfortable to think that someone from America came to Cuba and saved these musicians, and that is fine. But the idea to bring the old guys to life was mine.”
Indeed, Gonzalez began his campaign in the late 1970s, when he created the legendary Sierra Maestra, a band that celebrated historic Afro-Cuban musical forms and by the ’80s had emerged as one of the most important non-rock ensembles on the island. With its repertoire of exquisitely lyrical son and intricately conceived Afro-Cuban jazz, Sierra Maestra foreshadowed the revival of interest in traditional musical forms among listeners in Cuba, the United States and beyond.
“We created Sierra Maestra to bring to the youth the sound of the original Cuban music,” explains Gonzalez, who’s known across the island simply as Juan de Marcos.
“Basically, we tried to make a revolution in the taste of the youth. And we accomplished it, because Sierra Maestra became maybe the most important group in Cuba in the ’80s. Our main object was to show the youth that we in Cuba had a history, a very important history.
“It was important that young Cubans have the spirit of this music inside of them, to discover themselves through this music.”
The remarkable artistic success Gonzalez achieved by bringing young and old musicians together in Sierra Maestra inspired him to follow the same approach when Cooder and the World Circuit/Nonesuch label came calling in Havana in ’96. But it was Gonzalez and his wife and artistic collaborator, Gliceria, who located the forgotten Cuban virtuosos and brought them to Havana’s Egrem recording studio to cut “The Buena Vista Social Club.” The sessions went so well that they also yielded two more pivotal recordings: “Introducing Ruben Gonzalez” and the Afro-Cuban All Stars’ “A Toda Cuba le Gusta.”
“The man who brought us back to the world and to the United States was Juan de Marcos, the passion was his,” recalled Compay Segundo, speaking through an interpreter, during a conversation a year ago in Havana. “Juan de Marcos believed the world would embrace us once again, and he was right. For this he deserves tremendous credit.”
To Gonzalez, however, it’s a wonder that no one else had thought of bringing back to the international stage Cuba’s genre-defining artists.
“For some of the musicians that my wife and I found, it was like a dream when we came to them and said we wanted to record them again,” recalls Gonzalez. Vocalist “Ibrahim Ferrer thought it was a joke, because nobody cared about him anymore. [Pianist] Ruben Gonzalez said, `Thank you very much for believing in me,’ which was very touching to us.
“But I always have believed in the mixing of generations, because the youth brings strength and energy to their performances, and the old guys bring the real Cuban history. Probably I’m a bit idealistic, but this is the way I think.”
This distinctive blending of youthful exuberance and hard-won experience has given listeners a poignant view of one of the world’s most vibrant musical cultures. Because slaves from various African tribes, as well as immigrants from Spain and the Caribbean, long have lived in Cuba, the island always has been a cauldron of exotic musical experimentation.
Gonzalez has captured at least a few of these strains in the recordings he has produced, and they have ranked among the most admired world-music CDs. Most recently, he and his Afro-Cuban All Stars have brought out “Distinto, diferente” (World Circuit/Nonesuch), which explores more contemporary facets of Cuban music.
For Americans, especially, these recordings have been invaluable, since the sounds of Cuba had been difficult to come by during the United States’ long-running embargo of the island.
Moreover, the critical and commercial success of these albums has made Gonzalez a recognized force in the music business, which is why he plans to open his own, London-based label within the next year. The new, still-to-be-named label will document ancient and modern Cuban music, from historic charanga to Cuban pop, with Gonzalez making his recordings on the island but distributing them via London.
Should Gonzalez’s label take flight, the man might finally receive the wider recognition that he deserves. Even if he doesn’t, however, at least the aficionados will know that he was the musician who produced the most important Cuban recording sessions of recent years (in addition to singing and playing tres and guitar on these discs).
But even a producer-musician as formidable as Gonzalez knows that the United States’ infatuation with any passing fad–in this case, Cuban music–is temporary at best.
“Right now we are in the boom, but the boom is going to pass, of course,” says Gonzalez, 45. “What’s going to remain is that Cuban music at least will be a valid option for audiences, just as it was before 1959,” when the U.S. government began to isolate Cuba.
“Our music completely disappeared off of the market then, but now we are back.”
And the lion’s share of the credit belongs to Gonzalez.
