Buena Vista Social Club CD

Buena Vista Social Club: Compay Segundo (vocals, guitar, congas); Eliades Ochoa (vocals, guitar); Ibrahim Ferrer (vocals, bongos, clave); Ry Cooder (acoustic & electric slide guitars, guitar, oud, bolon, mbira, percussion); Ruben Gonzalez (piano).
Additional personnel includes: Juan de Marcos Gonzalez (conductor, guiro, background vocals); Julio Alberto Fernandez (vocals, maracas); Manuel "Puntillita" Licea (vocals, congas); Omara Portuondo (vocals); Benito Suarez Magana (guitar); Barbarito Torres (laoud); Manuel "Guajiro" Mirabal (trumpet); Orlando "Cachaito" Lopez, Salvador Repilado Labrada (bass); Joachim Cooder (drums, udu drum, dumbeck, conga); Alberto "Virgillo" Valdes (maracas, background vocals).
Recorded at Egrem Studios, Havana, Cuba, March, 1996. Includes liner notes by Nick Gold and Nigel Williamson.
BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB won the 1998 Grammy Award for Best Tropical Latin Performance.
Personnel: Ry Cooder (vocals, guitar, mandolin); Compay Segundo (vocals, guitar, congas, background vocals); Eliades Ochoa (vocals, guitar); Julio Fernandez (vocals, maracas); Ibrahim Ferrer, Manuel "Puntillita" Licea (vocals, background vocals); Omara Portuondo (vocals); Benito Suárez Magana (guitar); Manuel "El Guajiro" Mirabal (trumpet); Rubén González (piano); Lázaro Villa (congas, guiro); Carlos González (bongos, cowbells); Juan de Marcos González (guiro, background vocals); Alberto Valdés (maracas); Julienne Oviedo Sánchez (timbales); Luis Barzaga (background vocals).
Audio Mixer: Jerry Boys.
Liner Note Author: Ry Cooder.
Recording information: EGREM Studios, Havana, Cuba (03/1996); Ocean Way Studios, Hollywood, CA (03/1996).
Photographer: Susan Titelman.
Translators: Francesca Clarke; Jenny Adlington.
Unknown Contributor Roles: Maria Rodriguez; Alberto Valdés; Nigel Williamson.
This album is named after a members-only club that was opened in Havana in pre-Castro times, a period of unbelievable musical activity in Cuba. While bandleader Desi Arnaz became a huge hit in the States, several equally talented musicians never saw success outside their native country, and have had nothing but their music to sustain them during the Castro reign. Ry Cooder went to Cuba to record a musical documentary of these performers. Many of the musicians on this album have been playing for more than a half century, and they sing and play with an obvious love for the material. Cooder could have recorded these songs without paying the musicians a cent; one can imagine them jumping up and grabbing for their instruments at the slightest opportunity, just to play. Most of the songs are a real treasure, traversing a lot of ground in Cuba's musical history. There's the opening tune, "Chan Chan," a composition by 89-year-old Compay Segundo, who was a bandleader in the '50s; the cover of the early-'50s tune "De Camino a la Verada," sung by the 72-year-old composer Ibrahim Ferrer, who interrupted his daily walk through Havana just long enough to record; or the amazing piano playing on "Pablo Nuevo" by 77-year-old Rubén González, who has a unique style that blends jazz, mambo, and a certain amount of playfulness. All of these songs were recorded live -- some of them in the musicians' small apartments -- and the sound is incredibly deep and rich, something that would have been lost in digital recording and overdubbing. Cooder brought just the right amount of reverence to this material, and it shows in his production, playing, and detailed liner notes. If you get one album of Cuban music, this should be the one. ~ Steve McMullen
That Ry Cooder, you've got to keep an eye on him every minute, or he jumps into another cross-cultural collaboration. In the wake of his landmark recordings TALKING TIMBUKTU with Ali Farka Toure and A MEETING BY THE RIVER with V.M. Bhatt comes BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB, essentially a supergroup of traditional Cuban musicians with the addition of international agitator Cooder. Somehow, Cooder always findRolling Stone (9/18/97, p.104) - 3.5 Stars (out of 5) - "...revisit[s] the lovelorn ballads, patriotic hymns and gentle son-based dance numbers heard in swank Havana lounges as far back as the 1920s....enduring reminders that in Cuba, the wisdom of the ages still counts for something."
Spin (9/99, p.156) - Ranked #71 in Spin Magazine's "90 Greatest Albums of the '90s."
Entertainment Weekly (10/03/97, p.85) - "...The rhythms vary, but the sound is gentle yet flamboyant throughout. It brims with warmth." - Rating: B+
Q (1/98, p.112) - Included in Q Magazine's "50 Best Albums of 1997."
Vibe (11/97, p.152) - "...The beguiling fusion of Cooder's twangy slide guitar with the danzon and other, conga-tinged Afro-Hispanic rhythms...makes for an exciting multicultural marriage..."
Village Voice (2/24/98) - Ranked #21 in the Village Voice's 1997 Pazz & Jop Critics' Poll.
Mojo (Publisher) (p.65) - Ranked #23 in Mojo's "100 Modern Classics" -- "Witty, wistful, and above all wise."