远景俱乐部 (1997)

Buena Vista Social Club is the debut and only studio album by Cuban musical esemble Buena Vista Social Club, directed by Juan de Marcos González and American guitarist Ry Cooder. Produced by Cooder, it was recorded at Havana's EGREM studios in March 1996 and released on June 23, 1997, through World Circuit internationally. Release in the United States followed on September 16 by Nonesuch Records. It is the only standard studio album exclusively credited to the Buena Vista Social Club.

Buena Vista Social Club was recorded in parallel with A toda Cuba le gusta by the Afro-Cuban All Stars, a similar project also promoted by World Circuit executive Nick Gold and featuring largely the same lineup. In contrast to A toda Cuba le gusta, which was conceived as a revival of the son conjunto, Buena Vista Social Club was meant to bring back the traditional trova and filin, a mellower take on the Cuban son and bolero, as well as the danzón.

The album was a critical and commercial success and is one of the best-selling Latin albums of all time. Its release was followed by a short concert tour in Amsterdam and New York's Carnegie Hall in 1998. Footage from these dates, as well as from the recording sessions in Havana, was shown in the 1999 documentary Buena Vista Social Club directed by Wim Wenders. In 2022, the album was selected for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally historically or aesthetically significant". In the same year it was recognized by the Guinness World Records as the best-selling world music album.

Background

In 1996, American guitarist Ry Cooder was invited to Havana by British world music producer Nick Gold of World Circuit Records to record a session in which two African highlife musicians from Mali were to collaborate with Cuban musicians. When Cooder arrived (via Mexico to avoid the ongoing U.S. trade and travel embargo against Cuba), it was found that the musicians from Africa had not received their visas and were unable to come. Cooder and Gold changed their plans and decided to record an album of Cuban son music with local musicians instead. Cuban musicians already involved in the African collaboration project included bassist Orlando "Cachaito" López, guitarist Eliades Ochoa and musical director Juan de Marcos González, who had himself been organizing a similar project for the Afro-Cuban All Stars. A search for additional musicians led the team to singer Manuel "Puntillita" Licea, pianist Rubén González, trumpeter Manuel "Guajiro" Mirabal and octogenarian singer Compay Segundo, who all agreed to record for the project.

Cooder, Gold and de Marcos organized a large group of performers (twenty are credited) and arranged recording sessions at Havana's EGREM Studios, formerly owned by RCA records, where the equipment and atmosphere had remained unchanged since the 1950s. Communication between the Spanish and English speakers at the studio was conducted via an interpreter, although Cooder reflected that "musicians understand each other through means other than speaking".

Recording

The album contained fourteen tracks and was recorded in six days. It opened with "Chan Chan" written by Compay Segundo, a four-chord son (Dm, F, Gm, A7) that was to become what Cooder described as "the Buena Vista's calling card"; and ending with a rendition of "La bayamesa", a traditional Cuban patriotic song (not to be confused with the Cuban national anthem of the same name). The sessions also produced material for the subsequent release Introducing...Rubén González which showcased the work of the Cuban pianist. Among the songs left off the album were the classic bolero-son "Lágrimas negras", which was deemed too popular for inclusion, and Compay Segundo's "Macusa". Both songs were later released on the compilation Lost and Found.

Songs

The majority of the album comprised standards of the trova and filin repertoire, namely sones, guajiras and boleros typically played by small guitar-led ensembles. A foremost example of the son tradition on the album was "Chan Chan", the group's signature tune and the album opener. Written in the 1980s, it was one of Compay Segundo's most famous songs and one he had recorded several times, most notably with Eliades Ochoa and his Cuarteto Patria. The same formula was followed in this recording, with Ochoa singing lead and Segundo on second voice (as his artist name indicated). The song's lyrics depicted a rural scene with two characters, Juanita and Chan Chan. "Chan Chan" was followed by "De camino a la vereda", another son, written and sung by Ibrahim Ferrer.