The young drummer finished recording the first album of his Reversible project, even with the losses in the group due to emigration, and he hopes to present it in Cuba.

The test of time, it is known, is not passed by anyone. The film “Habana Blues” still dazzles and awes today.

We have witnessed passionate polemics, censorship, acts of justice... At the center of everything, is Cuba.

Pedro Luis Ferrer has left his name in the outskirts of existence and has become a word that seems made for him: a minstrel....

The Cuban musician tells OnCuba about his meeting with the legendary Beatles, who attended a concert by Cimafunk and La Tribu in New York.

Nothing about a country is foreign to culture.

City authorities named a street in honor of the legendary Cuban singer.

Aymée Nuviola does not stop with the joy from obtaining, last year, a Grammy from the American Academy for her album A Journey Through Cuban Music. She won the award in the same category as she saw Celia Cruz and Gloria Estefan, two other women-symbols of Cuban music, win two years ago. Aymée, based in Miami, does not rest in the search for her own truth and transcendence. She does it through the projects she has embodied even during this pandemic, of which she also felt the ravages in her own body. She recovered from the coronavirus with her husband, producer Paulo Simeon, to continue creating and occupying a privileged place in the island’s music. In 2020 Aymée Nuviola won a Grammy in the category of Best Tropical Album along with Marc Anthony, who was on the list with his album Opus. Nuviola made no secret of her surprise when she was named as a winner at the historic awards ceremony. Upon reaching the stage, she only managed to say: “Oh my God!” “I am here representing Cuba’s music. It’s a great honor for me.” Nuviola has engraved that memory in her memory. She assures me from her apartment, where...

The pianist plans to continue the experiment with the fusion of reggaeton and jazz, an unprecedented mix on the Cuban scene.

The 82nd birthday of the author of the suite “Decamerón Negro" will be celebrated until Sunday with various actions aimed at pondering his talent and his contributions to the Cuban and international sound scene.

The filmmaker died this Monday at the age of 87.

Several years ago, I was invited by television director and documentary maker Juan Pin Vilar to a program on the Cubavisión Internacional channel, to talk about the promotion of electronic music and other aspects in Cuba. I told him that it was a controversial issue and that he could not leave anything out or overlook pioneering festivals of this genre such as the late Rotilla. He told me to say what I thought, that the hard core of the conversation would be included in the edition. Indeed, when I saw the broadcast of the program, I was surprised that the most important part of the exchange had aired. I was very satisfied with his work as director and scriptwriter of the space. Juan Pin no longer works in Cuban television (nor do I in the Granma newspaper). He is promoting his career as an independent filmmaker and continues to direct works that he considers to have something to contribute to the cultural diversity of the country (I now work for OnCuba). Juan Pin Vilar’s career has always been surrounded by controversy. He is someone who says what he thinks and that has brought him more than one confrontation in various...

Filmmaker Ernesto Juan Castellanos is about to finish a documentary about the festival, a milestone in cultural relations between Cuba and the United States.

His performances were a portrait of Cuban society and the vision he had about his country. He never resorted to the easy joke, to the simplicity of speech born of the pun or shameful mockery.

Help us keep OnCuba alive here The news was a bombshell in Havana. Jazz star Dizzy Gillespie, visiting Cuba to participate in the International Jazz Plaza Festival in 1985, approached a young Gonzalo Rubalcaba on the stage of the Parisien hotel, to invite him to the concert he would give the following night. The musician, barely 17 years old, was surprised and after that a horizon of infinite possibilities opened up in his career. Gonzalo is today, along with Chucho Valdés, one of the main exponents of Cuban jazz on the world circuit. The musician left Cuba more than 30 years ago and his career quickly rose to the pinnacle of jazz. With several Grammy Awards and major collaborations in the jazz world, Rubalcaba was preparing to embark on a new world tour with singer Aymée Nuviola, but the project was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic. From his home in Miami, where he lives “just about 4 minutes away by car” from his colleague and friend Chucho Valdés, Rubalcaba has spent almost 3 months in confinement with his family. He has used this time to finish the album Viento y tiempo, which he recorded with Nuviola, and to carry...

The search for freedom has always throbbed from below, imposing itself on a transcendent area in the history of music. We already know that freedom has been a concept as manipulated as it has been decontextualized, and has not often lost part of its most vital meanings along the way. But the desire to conquer it has been a fundamental objective of many battles, as sexual minorities have exhibited in the face of oppression, marginalization or discrimination of all kinds. That struggle has not had a colorless or gray sound. Rather it has had behind it a feverish music band, which has given consistency and fervor to the songs of the rainbow. According to their own personal experiences, each one has given an interpretation to the songs that have accompanied them along that journey. It hasn’t been easy, but in the end, from intimacy or from the marches with the raised multicolored flags, they have managed to unite in songs that have become hymns of a cause that is not only gay, lesbian or intersex. These songs also belong to those who know that, although a theme cannot completely cure us, it does have a curative influence on the history...

With the spread of the coronavirus around the world, there has been an explosion of memes on social networks with the popular theme of “Me voy,” by the popular Cuban musician Cimafunk. The song was just what was needed for many Internet users to call on people, in a humorous tone, to stay home in the face of the health emergency caused by the pandemic. “Me voy,” belonging to the first Cimafunk album, Terapia, is experiencing a rebirth at this time after the enormous success it achieved after its premiere in 2018 by this musician and composer born in Pinar del Río, one of the undisputed stars of contemporary Cuban music. The artist has just returned to Cuba after several tours outside the island and has gone to lock himself up in his house, but he has not stopped developing new projects that he hopes to resume when the health emergency is just a bad memory. Meme on the theme “Me voy,” by Cuban artist Cimafunk. The musician has kept himself abreast of the new course his most popular song has taken so far, has reviewed the memes on Facebook and is grateful that it takes on a new meaning...

The U.S. Trombone Shorty Foundation will arrive at the International Jazz Plaza Festival to strengthen cultural ties between Cuba and New Orleans, with an agenda of concerts that can’t be missed, among which the performances of the Tank and the Bangas and The Soul Rebels bands, and Chief Monk stand out. The president of the foundation, Bill Taylor, talked with OnCuba about this project called Getting Funky in Havana, which has among its precedents the visit made by the remarkable trombonist Troy Andrews (Trombone Shorty) to the Cuban capital more than two decades ago; an experience that defined the creative life of this influential musician, who has collaborated, among others, with stars of the caliber of Jeff Beck, the Dave Matthews Band and Lenny Kravitz. The Trombone Shorty Foundation will have a relevant presence in the Jazz Plaza. Photo: Laura Carbone Why is this Getting Funky in Havana trip important? New Orleans has a very rich and dynamic culture. One of the reasons why it is so powerful is that it mixes many diverse influences and styles―such as the gumbo metaphor―and different ingredients that come together to create a unique flavor. Connecting with Cuba is important because Cuba has an...

Cuba is a prodigal land for jazz. Historically, the island’s instrumentalists have triumphed on the world’s most relevant stages and have exerted a remarkable influence on generations of musicians both in Cuba and around the world. There is currently a thriving Cuban jazz scene represented by greats from the most diverse generations that converge and keep the country at the forefront of the genre. We propose a brief tour around the instrumentalists who have marked the evolution of Cuban jazz. The list is a work in progress because it’s impossible to summarize the contributions Cubans have made to the multiplicity of styles that coexist in that beautiful universe of jazz. GONZALO RUBALCABA (B. 1963, HAVANA) Gonzalo is at the top of any list of the best Cuban jazz players. With an extremely refined technique, and a unique style defined by his interest in deepening tradition from a contemporary perspective, Rubalcaba was “discovered” in 1982 at just 21 years old by the jazz star Dizzy Gillespie during a concert at the Parisien cabaret club. The American took the stage and invited Rubalcaba to accompany him at the concert he had planned at the Havana Jazz Festival. Mere months later Rubalcaba had...

Wearing a black T-shirt, two rings on his left hand and sunglasses, Cimafunk opens the door of the studio of the National Laboratory of Electroacoustic Music, in Vedado. The singer had just arrived an hour ago to finish recording the chorus voices for his new song "Potaje," in which he had the services of an all-star formed by Omara Portuondo, Chucho Valdés, the Aragón Orchestra and Pancho Amat. "Emphasize the voice more, give it more space, more breadth," the singer asks a girl who squanders her singing power in the solitude of the studio. She is behind the microphone and Cimafunk accompanies her with catchy choruses from the recording board. "What’s up, how’s everything, there’s water, soda, take whatever you want," he tells me as the musicians from his band start arriving. Most of them are less than 30 years old. One of them got to the installation on a skateboard. "A car almost killed me, it gave me a terrible fright because all of a sudden it seems the skateboard wasn’t working," one of the instrumentalists says with fear still showing on his face. The others don’t pay too much attention to the matter when they see that everything...

Yandy Núñez has just made a grand entrance to the history of world mountaineering. In three days he became the first Cuban to climb the 5,642 meters to the top of Mount Elbrus, the highest mountain in Europe located in southern Russia near the border with Georgia. There are no records, at least known, that another Cuban has been able to perform the feat. Which is why this Havanan recalls that he exploded with joy when he managed to climb to Europe’s rooftop. Yandy Núñez emigrated from Cuba in 2015. He currently lives in Reykjavik, Iceland, where he learned to be a guide on glacier exploration routes. The young 31-year-old Havanan, born in Calabazar, is at the Russian Mineralnye Vody airport while we chat via WhatsApp. The mountaineer speaks in gusts, still shaken by the adrenaline rush that runs through his body after touching the European sky. He checks his ticket and sets off for Moscow. In the air he finishes answering the questions about that feat he keeps in his heart as a medal won in a life or death battle. Yandy Núñez on top of the Elbrus. Photo: Courtesy of the interviewee. Why did you decide to face...

Descemer Bueno is a kind of music creation worker. The musician barely rests in his aim to take his music to all possible stages. Just a few months ago he made his debut in Argentina and has already imposed among his next destinations the conquest of the public of the South American country. His first concert in Argentina was in La Trastienda, a well-known club of that country’s artistic circuit. There were two musicians in the audience who were carefully listening to his songs: Javier Calamaro, brother of the legend Andrés Calamaro, and Ulises Bueno. With the second he not only shares his last name, but also his desire to conquer, to expand. Descemer's songs have been heard in half the world, sung by him and by other international performers. In Argentina they are trickling in. There, Ulises is an icon of the genre called quartet, a mixture of ska, reggae, cumbia and fast rock and roll. Ulises, brother of a musician, Rodrigo, who had his heyday and died almost 20 years ago when he was at the height of his popularity, set out to continue his legacy and defend a work that will last and not be dilapidated by...

Cimafunk has never been patient. The musician did not sit down to wait for luck to knock on his door and he set off to conquer the world after leaving the medical career in Pinar del Río and making a living in different trades when he settled in Havana. He knocked on doors that remained closed and opened others with the will of a long-distance runner. Erick Iglesias, his real name, got everybody on the island eating out of his hand and in a very short time he has hoisted his flag of stylistic miscegenation in a handful of the main sites that are part of the universal history of music. On his return to the United States he filled Central Park to capacity this Monday during the summer concerts and put thousands of people dancing to the rhythm of his Terapia. The public included a large Latino community who knew about the "Cimafunk phenomenon" and others who sat down on the grass of Central Park to witness that kind of rhythmic orgy caused by the drive of these rhythms inherited by the Cuban from his African ancestors and all those stars who have traveled the path of the origins...

Alden González accumulated enough merits as a producer during his work with the Septeto Santiaguero. He won two Grammy Awards with the group and contributed to giving some shape to records that bear witness to the international drive and high credits of traditional Cuban music. After his departure from the group he put together an ambitious album project with experienced arranger and producer Geovanis Alcántara, which will soon come out to keep root music on a steady footing in Cuba. For this they summoned three heavyweights from the island’s music scene: Mayito Rivera, Alain Pérez and Alexander Abreu. The album A romper el coco was recorded in the Havana and Santiago de Cuba EGREM studios, and treasures 10 anthological themes of Cuban music given by the island's sound contemporaneity and the proven experience of its producers. "Working with those three greats of music was a big challenge. They have great knowledge about what they are doing. With the Septeto I was part of the group, but now it’s different. I have to make sure that everything I present is convincing," says Alden in an interview with OnCuba. "I have been friends with Alain Pérez for years, also based on the...

Carlos Lechuga is 35 years old and is one of the young filmmakers with one of the most relevant works in Cuba. In 2012 he presented his opera prima Melaza and four years later he premiered his second feature film, the controversial Santa y Andrés. Lechuga has carried out his work independently and has been recognized in the international film circuit. Although he has suffered misunderstanding and censorship, he continues to defend the idea that Cuban cinema must chronicle the country and tell its stories, however hard they may be. The filmmaker, whose work is about to be consolidated within the so-called author's cinema, is preparing his third film, Vicenta B, with an obvious autobiographical nuance. He spoke exclusively with OnCuba about this project, as well as about the controversies surrounding his other films and the so-called independent cinema. How did the idea of ​​Vicenta B come about? It came from the idea of ​​making a film about the existential crisis of a black woman. Most of the time we see Caribbean or African women represented in films, the problems that afflict them are very real, material. Almost every time that topics such as "the silence of God" or "lack...