Category: cuba

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cuba salsa

@Manolito, like Casa de la Musica all over again


nic and mel
Originally uploaded by mgharris

For a little while last night at the Coronet (Elephant and Castle, London), I felt as though we were back in Casa de la Musica, Havana.

Nic and Mel were even there…if you read this blog you might remember that we first saw them in Havana’s famous dance hall on Galiano Street, grooving away with sexy male dancers Bustamente and Yoandy, when I snuck my 14-year-old daughter in to see Maikel Blanco.

Manolito Simonet y Su Trabuco are one of Cuba’s top bands, one of the world’s top salsa bands and like all these outfits, unbelievably tight and accomplished, all 16 of them. The musicianship is quite astonishing. You get used to it but when you listen to a run of the mill live jazz act you suddenly realise just how fantastic these top salsa bands are.

Manolito have a few songs which are currently club favourites, like ‘Marcando la Distancia’ (a song about divorce), ‘Control’ (a reggaeton favourite) and the crowd-pleasing, chorus rousing ‘Locos por Mi Habana’. Apart from that they also mastered cha-cha-cha (latest hit, ‘Se Rompieron los Termometros’), sophisticated latin-jazz instrumentals and even a bolero! (all the above songs titles link to Youtube videos.)

These tickets have been selling at every salsa event we’ve been to for the past six weeks, so there were many familiar faces. A really wonderful feeling, to be part of this loosely connected but joyous community of Cuban salsa fans.

And here’s a photo of me at the concert with my best friend Becs:

Really must buy a good small camera for these things…BlackBerry is not up to the job…

Thanks again to MamboCity for organising this gig!

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cuba salsa

"Too Much Salsa and You Could Die"

That’s what Cuban salsa dance teacher Osbanis Tejedo said at breakfast on Sunday morning to the DJ. He was asking him to stir up the music a bit, some bachata, some merengue, some reggaeton.

Well, despite those words, I remember last night being mostly salsa…and the night before and the night before. I think I may in fact be dying from too much salsa. I feel as though I’ve been out on a drinking bender, absolutely shattered. And in the past three days I’ve had no more than one glass of wine.

It must be dehydration. Let me weigh myself…nope, no change there.

Salsa is definitely like a drug. It makes you feel amazing, you forget all your troubles while it lasts. Then you come back down to earth and realise that your problems haven’t gone away, for goodness sakes. They’re right there waiting to be dealt with, how dare they! And what do you turn to for a solution…?

More salsa.

It was great to be with a hundred or so like-minded addicts. How we sweated to get our rumba moves right, to move like the African spirits, the Orishas, how we strove to follow the tiny-but-fiery Damarys in her energetic and outrageously sexy reggaeton routine, how we concentrated on Kerry Ribchester’s wonderful body-movement techniques to move ribcages for Cuban son, and laughed at Leo and Osbanis’s flirty rueda moves.

Last night, you saw it all pouring out on the dance floor. Salsa with rumba, orishas, reggaeton, son, all mixed up. Okay, most people there were Northern European (and I was raised here, so I too started off stiff-as-a-board), but we were beginning to get there.

But man, am I exhausted.

Now, when’s the next salsa thing…?

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cuba salsa

Fiesta de Los Rumberos


Fiesta de Los Rumberos
Originally uploaded by mgharris

Rafael del Busto (in the cap) takes everyone through some moves in a warm-up Rueda de casino.

I felt sorry for non-salsa guests at the Arora hotel, Crawley. The music from the party went on until 2am at least and was easily audible in our room on the 2nd floor – enough to sing along with the lyrics.

MG – why were you trying to sleep when there was Cuban salsa? Well for one thing, 3 consecutive very late nights is beyond me. We wanted to be fresh for a long day of workshops beginning with Ariel teaching Cuban son.

Tonight though, we’ll stay until the end. Some friends are kindly taking care of our little daughter so it’s that VERY rare event for parents- a night off!

Just as well. I bet the hotel will get complaints from other guests. But tonight…I want that salsa played LOUD.

Emailed from my BlackBerry®

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cuba

Buena Vista Night – July

What a pity I’m going to miss the next Buena Vista Night in Oxford. It’s quite become the highlight of the month, although with all the festivities in London lately at Carnival de Cuba and next week’s Afro-Cuban Weekender, Habanaloko party the following week and the Manolito Concert at the Coronet at the end of the month, July looks like the best month this year for us UK-bound Cuba-loving salseros.

D and I arrived to watch Habanero Leo Henriquez from Brighton teaching the raunchiest rueda moves I’ve ever seen. Mangos, castiga-la (“she’s been naughty – slap her, you know you want to…”). I was kind of glad I wasn’t in the class. Hey – there are some salsa moves that I’ll only do with David.

(Well…maybe…until some Cuban guy comes along and tempts me into it…)

Over at the bar we had one of those brilliant reunions you sometimes get if you’ve been dancing for years and years – someone who’s dropped off the planet for a while will swoop back into Oxford and of course, they’ll visit the latest salsa joint. On Saturday it was Nick St Clair. Nick; blond Nick with the flowing blond mane and the tight white jeans, sexy Nick with the flashy Merc, Nick who once had his own salsa band. Yes, that Nick? You don’t know him? Ahhh. Before your time then?

I didn’t recognise Nick at first because he’s gone all Andaluz. Living in Granada, Spain will do that for you. His hair is darker, tied back in a gitano-style pony tail. He was dressed all in black. Nick has two kids now; gorgeous, he showed us pictures. I had a brilliant dance with Nick – he hasn’t lost his touch at all. My favourite Nick story is about an early dance experience of his. A sultry Spanish woman was dancing with him in a club, when he’d had just one or two lessons. She mistook his flamboyant clothes and hair for the att-it-tude of a guy who can dance. (Beginner need to watch out for that!) When she found out that he was a beginner she just left him there, walked away from him on the dance floor. Lo deje planta’o!

As Nick told me this story, it began to sound familiar. “I think I know that woman,” I told him. “In fact, I think she’s a good friend of mine – Ana.” So devastated was Nick by this treatment that he resolved to become a terrific dancer. And he did. So Ana did him a favour really, didn’t she?

We really enjoyed the set by DJ Shorty. She’s a very pretty girl. And she loves the music of Adalberto Alvarez!

So…next week…Crawley! For three nights and two days of all-salsa-all-the-time!

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cuba jaguar's realm other books

Following the railroad in Cuban Granma province


Following the railroad in Cuban Granma province
Originally uploaded by mgharris

I was delighted to see today on Flickr that someone favourited this photo. My husband David snapped this from a Viazul tourist bus as we crossed Cuba. He kindly took lots of photos of what you see of Cuba as you cross from West to East; Havana to Santiago de Cuba. This was so that when I came to write the relevant sections of Project Jaguar, I would be able to recall the images and atmosphere of this country.

Maybe I was asleep or watching the movie because I didn’t actually witness this scene myself so I’m even more grateful that he caught it. This captures the essence of how tough it is for Cubans to travel around in Cuba. Most people in Havana that we spoke to had never been to the other side of the island. And people in Santiago would tell us, “I went to Havana once, about twenty years ago.” (It’s not like in the UK where people are too busy going to Mallorca to go to London – they can’t go anywhere – it costs too much!)

Few people own a car, those who do tend to own cars that are too clapped out to get far without breaking down and of course there’s nothing like the RAC if you do. On the major roads you find small crowds of hitchhikers gathered under bridges, despondently waving money bills at passing private cars but mainly goods lorries. There’s no such thing as a free ride.

These hitchhikers aren’t game young students; ther are people of all ages, often with small children in tow.

I wonder where this woman in the photo is going with her two little ones. Waiting for a freight train to give her a lift? I wonder how long it took to get there.