Ibrahim Ferrer, RIP

Not to take anything away from Peter Jennings, who seems to have been a good man and a decent reporter, but to me it's clear that the biggest loss to humanity today is the death of Ibrahim Ferrer from Buena Vista Social Club. The New York Times obit reads that he was "an excellent bolero singer who used space and silence in his relaxed elegant delivery to increase the drama." I agree with this characterization. He was so good in fact that I came to really enjoy his music even though he sings in a vocal style I don't often enjoy. I compare him to someone like Nat King Cole who was a great singer and in much the same style. Yet even though I recognize Cole's greatness, I don't really choose to listen to his music and I don't own any of it. But I do enjoy Ferrer deeply and his passing is sad. I have to say that I was probably more sad when Compay Segundo died because he was my favorite of the musicians featured in Buena Vista Social Club.

This also reminds me that one of my least favorite things about Castro's regime was his attempt to create revolutionary art that served the abstract "people" as opposed to what people actually liked. The kind of music that Ferrer, Segundo, and the rest played was officially discouraged after the Cuban Revolution. These guys could not leave the country to promote their stuff nor could they play to paying audiences in Cuba. They faded into obscurity and many died before the renaissance of Cuban music started by Ry Cooder and Buena Vista Social Club. Really, who would want to be a part of a revolution that didn't understand the organic functions of music and art to people, and not as something that could be manipulated to serve the state? Obviously, states both to the left and the right have manipulated tastes to serve national interests. But doesn't that sound dull and deadening?