Buena Vista Social Club

The 1997 album by Cuban septuagenarians and friends was an astonishing success and relaunched many of the performers' careers. (Ry Cooder's shepherding of the project doubtless contributed to its success.) While the release is not necessarily representative of what's happening musically in Cuba at the moment, the resurrected songs are charmingly performed.

It makes some kind of cosmic sense that Ry Cooder – a slide guitarist whose collaborations
with Indian classical musicians and Tex-Mex stars have yielded recordings of rare and
unconventional beauty – would wind up in Cuba. The island is one of those places where
there are few barriers between high and mass culture, and folklore isn't something that
gathers dust in museums. For a category-basher like Cooder, it's almost heaven:... More >

Guitarist-producer intrusive, son worse, music mild, geezers grand ("Chan Chan," "Candela") (Grade - *)