Cuba by Sea
The Washington Post. Sunday, June 4, 2000; Page E01
The Cuba Cruise Corp., a Toronto travel agency, is marketing to Americans what it terms the first "legal" cruises from the Bahamas to Havana since 1963--despite the U.S. Treasury Department's longstanding embargo prohibiting travel to Cuba by U.S. citizens.
The only way Americans can travel to Cuba legally is to obtain a special license from Treasury (or to travel as a guest of the Cuban government); the agency, charged with enforcing the U.S. trade embargo with Cuba, prohibits all other trips. The Canadian government has placed no such
restrictions on its citizens. But Sam Blyth, owner of Cuba Cruise, claims he's found a loophole in Treasury's law that will permit even those Americans without special licenses to legally visit Havana.
How? Americans will be fully "hosted" on the trip and will not technically spend money while on Cuban soil. Cruisers will, of course, pay the Canadian company for the voyage (including all meals and lodging). Organized sightseeing expeditions, tourist fees and port charges while in
port will be funded by a Canadian nonprofit foundation.
Daniel Waltz, Cuba Cruise's attorney at D.C.'s Patton Boggs LLP, assures CoGo that it's legal for Americans to go on this trip. "U.S regulations are clear that Americans can travel to Cuba on a fully hosted basis," he says. The company "has structured this product so that the
cruise passengers will spend no money while in Cuba to properly qualify as fully hosted."
A Treasury spokesman disputes this. "Americans cannot go to Cuba directly or indirectly" without a special license, she says. "Period. They cannot go." The spokeswoman, who declines to be named, is mum about whether Treasury will pursue Cuba Cruise. Blyth says he has not been
contacted by government officials, though he expects to be.
But he's not worried. If Treasury plans to enforce its regulations, he says, it has to "figure out how they're going to prosecute 1,400 people per week. We have a strong legal basis for Americans going there as hosted people."
For more information on the Cuba cruises, which begin Nov. 16, call Blyth & Co. Travel at 800-387-1387, www.cubacruising.com. For more on the regulations, visit Treasury's Web site at www.treas.gov/ofac.
Case Closed. Please
By Mary McGrory. The Washington Post. Sunday, June 4, 2000; Page B01
Yes, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, finally says--although not in so many words--Elian can go home. Yes, Cuba "does violate human rights and fundamental freedoms and does not guarantee the rule of law." Yes, the three judges admit, "reeducation, communist
indoctrination and political manipulation . . . for propaganda purposes are not beyond the realm of possibility."
Nonetheless, the three judges say in their willfully dry decision. "Nonetheless" tolls like a bell through these unemotional pages. The judges hold their robes free of the messy realities that have engaged our attention for too long. To them, it is not a matter of fathers and sons, it
is a matter of "separation of powers" and the legality of a 6-year-old applying for asylum.
The court gives more than due deference to the uneven performance of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which, like every other government entity, is intimidated by the clamorous Cubans of Miami. The immigration authorities did not send Elian home to Cuba promptly, as they do so many
castaways. Instead, he was put in the hands of his great uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez, an unemployed Castro hater; Lazaro's daughter, Marisleysis; and the rest of the fanatical Miami Cubans. The winsome survivor was put to work in their cause. He was hauled out of the house to oblige the ever-present
cameras and meet news deadlines. Marisleysis identified herself as his "foster mother," while alternately sobbing out her fears of the torture that awaited him in Cuba and giggling with her girlfriends.
Diane Sawyer had a play date with the famous waif and stood on her head, which is what American politicians were doing for the Miami Cubans. Vice President Gore did a giant pander, insisting that the matter belonged in family court. He paid dearly for his folly. Yet he was still arguing last
week for the case to go to family court, even after the appeals court spoke.
What kind of a life will Elian have when he goes back? Will he be surrounded by cameras night and day as he was in Little Havana--with the single difference that all the camera people will be speaking Spanish? It seems too much to hope that Fidel Castro, who is not a subtle man, will rest before
making sure that every person on the planet understands who won this latest round with the gringos.
Have we seen the last of the relatives? Lazaro Gonzalez, who might not have done well under the scrutiny of social workers had the custody matter gone to family court, may fade away. He glowers convincingly but, after 15 years in the country he professes to love so deeply, has yet to learn
English. Marisleysis will undoubtedly have her own television talk show--on child care. Donato Dalrymple, the house cleaner who on his single fishing expedition helped scoop Elian out of the Atlantic on Thanksgiving Day, will not go quietly. He has grown accustomed to the bright lights, to being
hailed as "El Pescador," and has found his real calling as a career opportunist: He is suing the government for violation of his civil rights during the Easter weekend raid that brought Elian out of Miami.
Gregory Craig, the lawyer for Elian's father and the object of much right-wing rant, says the substance of the case is over. But Juan Miguel Gonzalez, his wife and children have to stay here two weeks more in case the relatives appeal.
The country is with Juan Miguel in this fight. The diehards hope that somehow he will come to his senses and beg to stay here. But Juan Miguel, you would have to say, has not seen us at our best.
He might have concluded that this is a violent society. On Holy Saturday, he awakened to the sight of terrified Elian facing the business end of a submachine gun--only Craig's quick-wittedness in producing a disposable camera and a photo of father and son, beamingly reunited, saved the day. On
Easter Monday, from the government retreat on the Wye River, Juan Miguel watched coverage of a teenage gunman who had opened fire on children at the entrance to the National Zoo.
He learned that Lazaro Gonzalez had defied a direct order from the attorney general, heard Cuban-American mayors practically invite their constituents to riot to keep Elian in the United States, watched citizens ride up to City Hall and throw bananas to protest the firing of the police chief who
refused to warn the mayor of the imminent raid.
Although Juan Miguel had heard much about the freedom to travel, he did not have it. The judges made him stay here while they ruminated. He seems eager to abandon the comforts of Northwest Washington so that local liberals can resume walking their dogs on the Cleveland Park estate that he and
those federal marshals have been occupying for more than a week. It is hard for some Americans to understand how a man could leave affluence and celebrity for a dingy seaside town where 1953 Oldsmobiles are luxury cars.
Nonetheless, as the judges so often say, he prefers to go home with his son.
In Cuba, Rhythm & Dues
By Eugene Robinson. Washington Post Staff Writer. Sunday, June 4, 2000; Page G01
HAVANA –– It's well past midnight, and one of the city's hottest music venues, the Salon Rosado de la Tropical, is doing a slow burn. The band, a top-rank ensemble called Bamboleo, is cruising through a lyrical salsa. Beneath a star-strewn sky, couples crowd the huge dance floor,
bumping, grinding, whipping suddenly into dazzling spins and twirls too tight to be improvised but too loose to be choreographed.
Then something explosive happens--something that would blow the roof off the joint, if it had a roof. Singer Vannia Borges finishes the chorus, band leader Lazaro Valdes raises his hand, and Bamboleo switches gears.
The bass player slams into a lowdown, funky, almost bluesy lick; Valdes, on keyboard, takes up a hard, fast, repeating figure that he varies subtly each time through; the drummers deep-six the sly syncopation and bring up a driving, straight-ahead beat. All four of the band's singers join in,
rapping the song's hook again and again, a hit-the-road-Jack send-off of a deadbeat lover. The crowd shouts along. Above it all, a four-man horn section casts long, jazzy, sinuous lines--melody driven by raw power.
The dance floor goes wild. The jam goes on for five minutes, 10 minutes, longer; and no one can sit down, no one can stop. Sound and movement have conspired to produce a moment that flirts with both the delirious and the sublime.
This is a place beyond salsa. This is the realm of timba brava, the innovative Cuban dance music that fuses elements of jazz, funk and hip-hop with traditional Latin rhythms to create a unique sound--one that has already won international acclaim. Cuban music officials (there are officials for
everything in Cuba) go so far as to boast that only three truly vibrant and fertile strains of popular music exist in the world today: American, Brazilian and Cuban.
With Cuban musicians freer to travel, and with record companies newly eager to mine this rich lode, conditions are right for a contemporary Cuban sound to invade the United States for the first time since the pre-revolution days when the island's music meant big bands, dinner jackets, cigar
smoke and the likes of Desi Arnaz or the Mambo Kings.
The interest is there, spurred in part by the Buena Vista Social Club phenomenon, which has prompted curiosity about more recent Cuban music. Lots of product is reaching the shelves--Tower Records in Foggy Bottom, for example, now has an entire wall devoted to Cuban music, separate from the
omnibus "Latin music" bin. Cuban musicians are beginning to tour the States regularly. The quality of the music and the virtuosity of its players are at times breathtaking.
Established timba groups like Los Van Van (which basically invented the genre), NG La Banda, Charanga Habanera, Cubanismo, and Isaac Delgado and his orchestra are still going strong. Newer artists like Bamboleo, Paulito F.G., Manolin the Salsa Doctor and Azucar Negra are expanding the form,
often by adding riffs and rhythms that explicitly refer to black American funk of the 1970s and 1980s. Chucho Valdes, Irakere and Klimax have won great popularity in Europe with their supercharged Latin jazz. Groups like Amenaza and Instinto bring the timba sensibility to flat-out inner-city rap.
The only question--the only uncertainty that could keep Cuban timba from a real breakthrough in the American market--is whether music so aggressively engineered to make people dance can find enough of an audience in the concert hall and the living room. Cuban music might become a major factor in
the United States, but also might remain ensconced in what amounts to a hot, swinging, timbal-smashing, horn-blowing niche.
Musically, though, the commercial outcome is beside the point. In Fidel Castro's Cuba--a place where American cars from the 1950s cruise the streets, communism still must be taken seriously, fine old buildings crumble slowly to dust, nights begin late and last till dawn, dissidents risk getting
tossed into prison and not a single set of McDonald's golden arches beckons--something extraordinary is happening in music.
It's happening partly because of Castro's revolution, and partly in spite of it.
Timba is just the sharpest accent in a complex perfume of music that floats on the Cuban air. Walk down the street in Old Havana and you hear Cuban son--the form that gave rise to salsa and all its variants--spilling out of tourist bars. Sit in a park and someone will begin to strum a guitar and
sing a bolero. Go out into the neighborhoods where ordinary Cubans live, and you'll find young boys beating on drums or boxes, trying to get the basic rumba just right. And after dark--often way after dark--there's live music all over town.
Notes from one night in Havana:
Begin near Central Park at a little open-air bar called Feria Fornos. Every evening, a seven-piece band called Megason takes the cramped stage and plays its heart out, hoping to get noticed.
To say the music scene in Havana is competitive would be gross understatement. It's simple supply and demand--too many trained, accomplished, ambitious musicians chasing too few opportunities for regular gigs and recording opportunities. The major bands at the top of the ladder have been around
for years and aren't going anywhere--for example, Los Van Van, under the protean Juan Formell, just celebrated its 30th anniversary. The big acts monopolize the big showplace venues like the Tropicana and the Salon Rosado.
Groups like Megason occupy the lower rungs--not the very bottom, since Megason at least has steady work, but not up where anybody would notice them.
And they're good. Their instruments look like they've been through a war, and their repertoire is mostly cover versions of other artists' hits--songs like "Oye Como Va," which Carlos Santana made famous. But they play and sing well, and the group's members are remarkably versatile,
switching instruments at will. During any given song, Megason's one beat-up guitar might be passed through two or three sets of hands. All of them know what to do with it.
"Actually, we consider ourselves lucky, since at least we can work at what we love to do. A lot of musicians just have to play in the street," said Queider Zuniga, 27, one of Megason's singers and multi-instrumentalists. "The thing we hope for is getting seen, getting known."
Zuniga studied singing at one of the National Arts Schools (more about them later). He also studied economics, on his parents' counsel that he'd never earn a living as a musician.
In hopes of getting attention, last November the band paid to have a CD recorded. "It's not really high quality, but it's all we could afford," Zuniga said.
The boss on duty at the bar is curious why the band is doing so much talking and so little playing. Quickly they go back to work. The audience consists of maybe 20 people, including the bartender, the waiters, a few tourists, a few regulars and a group that looks like family members of the band.
On to the Plaza de la Revolucion--the grand ceremonial space where Castro summons the multitudes to hear his speeches, beneath a giant neon portrait of Che Guevara--and a basement club called the Cafe Cantante.
This venue is quite a bit higher on the ladder, and so is the band, an 11-piece timba group called Atache Habana. This ensemble's equipment is all new and its members are dressed in denim overalls and green T-shirts. One of the two singers, with his yellow-tinted glasses, shaved head and
earring, would look perfectly at home on the streets of SoHo or Adams-Morgan.
Atache Habana plays original songs, basically timba but with a funky backbeat that sounds as American as Cuban. Formed two years ago, the group has steady work around Havana but no recordings yet. It's knocking at the door of the big house, but not yet admitted.
"We're trying to do something distinctive with our music," says Carlos Cartalla, 31, the baby-faced keyboardist and music director for the group. "We think the way we emphasize the beat makes it more danceable."
Cartalla and most of the band are also graduates of the National Arts Schools. He looks tired--it's past midnight, he has another set to play, and Atache Habana doesn't get a day off for another two weeks.
On to yet another club, this time out in the city's tonier western precincts--the Casa de la Musica, one of the top three or four places in town to hear music. Here there's more of a buzz. The street outside is jammed with taxicabs, and there's a crowd of hangers-on trying to wheedle their way
inside without paying the $15 cover--for most ordinary Cubans, a prohibitive sum.
Tonight's headliner is Angel Bonne, whose band inhabits a more traditional groove--more or less classic salsa, with a lot of heat but without the funkiness and jazziness that characterize the timba sound. Compared with Atache Habana, the music sounds more polished, with super-tight horn
arrangements that fairly shimmer, but also more polite.
Still, the dance floor fills up--the only sure indication here of approval. Havana crowds are stinting with applause. When they like what you're playing, they get up and dance.
And they keep dancing. Bonne manages to end his show by 3.
The world has changed for Cuban musicians, and most seem to agree that it's changed for the better.
For one thing, musicians who once all earned a modest state salary can cut their own deals for performances and recordings. That means that when a top group like NG La Banda or Bamboleo plays the Salon Rosado, the musicians are free to demand a percentage of the gate. That income is subject to
taxation, in an arrangement that smacks loudly of free enterprise.
Cuban groups tend to be big, though--10 to 16 pieces would be the general range--and not all that money trickles down evenly. One recent night, for example, Elio Reve y Su Charangon, a well-known ensemble that serves up traditional salsa, played to a mostly full house at the Casa de la Musica.
The cover was $15 a person. One musician in the band said before the show that he would be paid around $10 for the night's work.
For Cuban musicians, the business of playing in Europe, Asia or South America is relatively straightforward: A government office plays the role of agent, arranging bookings and charging a 15 percent fee, and the musicians keep the rest. Essentially the same arrangement holds true for recording
contracts.
The business of playing in the United States, however, is more complicated. Because of U.S. law, Cuban musicians cannot be paid a fee for their performances in the United States--at least not directly. Under the theory that those performances amount to "cultural exchange" and not
business deals (which would be illegal), the musicians are supposed to be paid only for their travel, lodging and other expenses while they are in the States, plus a per diem allowance and the cost of health insurance.
Music industry insiders said, however, that for the major groups, this is sometimes a fiction. Concert payments can be routed through a third country without much of a problem.
And despite the U.S. trade embargo, a lot of the sound equipment on Cuban stages is American-made.
Beyond the vagaries of international law, the life of a Cuban musician is a lot like the life of a musician anywhere, meaning that it is defined by discipline and practice.
One recent Friday afternoon, drummer and band leader Giraldo Piloto was putting his ensemble Klimax through the paces in a deluxe practice space befitting the band's status--an auditorium with a stage big enough for the whole band to set up, even big enough for the singers to work on their
choreography.
Klimax was taking a hiatus from the week-in, week-out routine of playing around Havana to prepare for a tour of England, where it would play nine cities.
"When we're going to play in Europe, we have to spend more time practicing. You have to be ready," Piloto said. "The audiences over there like 'Latin jazz,' so we work a lot on those pieces." For its efforts, Klimax has become a fixture on the European jazz festival
circuit--Montreux, Nice, Perpignan.
Piloto (also the product of one of the National Arts Schools) took the band through an up-tempo jazz number, showing off his musicians' chops. Then he brought out the trio of singers and played a couple of pieces that were pure timba--except that in one, just when the music was at its hottest,
he had the horns overlay the whole roiling stew with the famous melody from Duke Ellington's "Caravan."
Piloto, already well established, still has a big chunk of the world to conquer: the United States. He's never toured the States, and his CDs are hard to find in U.S. record stores.
Across town, meanwhile, another group was practicing toward a more modest agenda: a start in the business.
The name: Aroma.
The gimmick: All the musicians and singers are women.
This is not in itself such a novelty anymore. Havana is in the midst of a sudden girl-group craze, with new ones formed every day. "What we want to show," said Marbis Manzaret, bongo player and director of the group, "is that women can play timba with the same power as the men."
Aroma was put together just two months ago, mostly of women who had played with other bands (and who had graduated from the National Arts Schools as well). Their rehearsal space is far from grand: the tiny living room of a small apartment, tucked behind a once-grand mansion that has faded to
ruin. The apartment is reached down a narrow walkway whose decrepitude is relieved by a lavish spray of pink flowers bursting over a mottled gray wall.
Finding any space at all to practice was a stroke of luck, though. The band also had to scramble to find instruments--the electric piano, for example, was gathering dust in one of the drummers' houses--and put together outfits to wear onstage. "We just went around to anybody who could lend
us some money," Manzaret said. "It's not easy getting started."
Nor is it easy getting ahead. "There's just a lot of competition," Manzaret said. "There are the places that offer dance music, but all the same big bands play there all the time. There are bands much more established than ours that don't have work. . . . There's just no space
open in the Havana nightlife scene, so we have to play in the tourist places."
The women in the 10-piece ensemble are young enough to have tattoos and wear chunky platform shoes. They all sight-read music with obvious fluency.
Daulema Fuentevilla, the keyboardist, put the group through the grueling paces of a new song, a merengue called "El Talisman." It was tough going--the rhythm was fast, unfamiliar and difficult, and various players kept coming in on the wrong beat. After a half-hour on this one piece,
they managed to make it through without serious mishap and everyone could take a break.
Aroma practices almost every day, for three hours or more. Steady gigs, recording contracts, membership in the club of elite bands--all that remains a dream.
One thing most of these musicians have in common, from the world-class instrumentalists of Klimax to the versatile troubadours of Megason, is that they are graduates of Cuba's system of National Arts Schools. These institutions, more than anything else, are the reason why the musicians who make
Cuban popular music are so outrageously skilled.
Alicia Perea, director of the government agency called the Cuban Institute of Music--and a sincere believer in the aims and accomplishments of the Cuban revolution--explained that in 1961, Castro set aside the grounds of the old Havana Country Club as the first National Arts School. Children all
over Cuba were tested for artistic ability, including musical ability, and then brought to the Country Club to study the arts. Over the years, that same basic system was expanded. Now, each child is tested at age 7 for various kinds of talent, including musical.
"We see if they can keep rhythm, if they can carry a tune, things like that," Perea said. "I used to be a teacher, and over 20 years I gave more than 5,000 of those tests myself."
Those scoring well on the music test are eligible to attend National Arts Schools, now scattered around the country, to study music. After completing elementary school, there's another test and those who score highest can move on to the secondary level of the National Arts School system. That's
as far as most people get--like Bamboleo band leader Valdes, or the singer Borges (who studied oboe in school), or the Aroma bongo player Manzaret (who studied clarinet).
The instruction is classical and rigorous. Those who make it through emerge with great technical facility.
The best of the best (like Fuentevilla of Aroma) go on to the Superior Instute of the Arts--a national university that now occupies the Havana Country Club grounds. There's a big performing space where the swimming pool used to be, and the counterrevolutionary outlines of golf course fairways
can still be discerned throughout the leafy grounds.
"That's an explosive combination--talent plus technique is a marvel," Perea said. "That's why we have the music that we have in Cuba today."
So in that sense, Castro's revolution clearly impelled the development of today's Cuban music. At the same time, though, Perea acknowledges that the system has also been a hindrance in some ways. "I don't want to give such a rosy picture," she said.
An obdurate bureaucracy still turns what should be simple transactions for musicians into complicated ordeals. Officials say the government these days acts more like an agent for the musicians than anything else, but the power relationship is not at all the same--in the capitalist world it's
clear that the agent works for the artist, while Cuba still has not entirely purged the notion that the artist works for the government. Musicians without steady gigs or the clout to demand private payment from club owners are left with their state salaries, which can amount to as little as $20 a
month.
And however enlightened the officials at the music ministry may be, it's not possible for a band to really break through in Cuba if it can't get on television. Officials of Cuba's state broadcasting apparatus are notoriously conservative and still think more in terms of propaganda than art. A
major ensemble like Juan Formell and Los Van Van has the stature and clout to present songs that comment on problems like overcrowding in Havana, woeful housing or the general clamor for greenbacks. A newer band trying to climb the ladder would think twice before being so bold.
Cuba's infrastructural deficiencies affect musicians like everyone else, and officials acknowledge that not all the problems can be blamed on the U.S. trade embargo. And in this socialist system, the arts of advertising and promotion are woefully stunted. It takes hours of effort, for example,
just to find out who's playing where in Havana on a given night, information that should be trumpeted to the world.
"In many ways," Perea said, "the world has changed. And not us."
In the beginning there were the different musical elements that colonizers and slaves brought to Cuba--European melodies, African rhythms. These fused into Cuban son, the sweet music of the Buena Vista era. With a little volume and speed, son became salsa and spread throughout the region. Then
Cuban musicians, better trained than ever before, violated the spirit of the U.S. embargo and imported liberal doses of American jazz and funk.
The end product can be heard late on a Sunday night--yes, a Sunday; don't people have to go to work in the morning?--at the Casa de la Musica, which is packed.
It's midnight before the first opening act comes on (a hip-hop ensemble that needs more rehearsing), 1 a.m. before the second opening act plays a note (another all-female salsa band). Nobody's dancing yet, but nobody leaves--this evening is planned as an event, maybe the biggest musical
happening of the week. Stars from other groups are spotted in the audience. For a socialist state, this scene is a pretty good approximation of glamour.
Then, promptly at 2, one of Havana's premier groups bursts onto the stage--Charanga Habanera, directed by band leader David Calzado. What follows is an hour and a half of pure energy.
The four singers, plus Calzado, jump and twirl through elaborate dance routines. The drummer, a slight teenager with dreadlocks, bounces all over the place. The horns are tight, the bass player is working it, the crowd knows all the songs and joins in on the choruses. Everyone is standing,
moving, cheering. It's way past 3 when the show ends.
Hardly anyone applauds. But the band isn't the least bit offended, because on this fine spring night, in the contradictory land of Fidel Castro, people danced like there was no tomorrow.
Playin' La Timba Brava: Cuba's Frothy Musical Stew.
By Eugene Robinson. Sunday, June 4, 2000; Page G09
These are a few of the major groups playing the new Cuban sound:
Los Van Van--The original, the granddaddy, the source. This ensemble, led by the legendary Juan Formell, remains Cuba's most popular group after an astounding 30 years. Van Van's trademark sound is unique; its lyrics often present sly commentary on the Cuban situation, to the point where one
government official there called Formell "the psychologist and sociologist of our country." The group's latest album--"Llego . . . Van Van"--is widely available, as is a 30-year retrospective box set.
NG La Banda--The "NG" stands for nueva generacion, or new generation, but this group has been around for quite a while. Directed by Jose Luis Cortes, NG La Banda is the quintessential timba group. The ensemble's strength is its tremendous power and precision. The horn players are
outstanding--check out the lightning-fast unison runs on "Papa Chango" from the "Best of NG La Banda" compilation. In fact, the horn section has its own nickname: "The Horns of Terror."
Isaac Delgado--A singer with a smooth baritone and a monster band behind him, Delgado is a huge star in Cuba: At times, his songs seem to monopolize the airwaves. His studio albums tend to be overproduced and under-ambitious, conveying practically none of the excitement of a live performance.
One exception is the "Forbidden Cuba" CD featuring a full and representative assortment of his tunes; second-best is a new "Grandes Exitos" ("Greatest Hits") disc, newly arrived in U.S. stores.
Bamboleo--Bandleader Lazaro Valdes says his major influences include Earth Wind & Fire, and that's audible in the group's sound--lots of bottom, lots of funk, lots of power in the horns. Bamboleo's music is easily accessible to American ears, which is perhaps why the group has already toured
the United States four times (it's scheduled to play here at the Nation on June 29). Bamboleo's latest CD, "Ya No Hace Falta," is irresistible and in the stores; a new, live album is scheduled to appear soon.
Manolin, El Medico de la Salsa--This young singer-songwriter-bandleader got his nickname ("The Salsa Doctor") because he gave up his medical studies for a music career. His brand of timba is modern, streamlined and laced with funk. His CD "De Buena Fe," spottily available
here, is uneven but has a couple of incendiary cuts ("Somos Lo Que Hay" is the best) that give an idea of what all the fuss is about.
Adalberto Alvarez y su Son--For contrast, a slightly less aggressive sound. Alvarez and his group play strong, beautifully crafted salsa without rough edges. His recent album "Jugando con Candela" ("Playing with Fire") is slickly but unobtrusively produced, and offers ample
proof that Cuban music can be polite and still burn.
Cubanismo--Timba and son from one of Cuba's hottest ensembles. The group features Jesus Alemany, who is often named as one of the best trumpet players in the world. CDs are fairly widely available.
Chucho Valdes--One of the most talented and innovative jazz pianists around, and a legend in Havana's music circles. In this super-competitive world where everybody's got amazing technique, a player who's invited to sit in with "Chucho" has truly arrived. Albums are widely available
here.
Cuban Entrepreneurs to Visit U.S.
By John Burgess. Washington Post Staff Writer. Saturday, June 3, 2000; Page E01
The Cuban government has agreed to let Cuban entrepreneurs come to the United States for educational tours, a move that business executives here called a first and an unusual sign of openness in the country's state-run economy.
A U.S. Chamber of Commerce group that visited Havana earlier this week reached agreement that the first delegations to come, likely in September, would be restaurant owners and farmers producing for sale in Cuba's limited free markets, said Craig Johnstone, a chamber senior vice president who
led the group.
The United States maintains a general trade embargo against Cuba, one of the world's few remaining communist countries. Cuba's President Fidel Castro does not let Cuban citizens travel freely to the United States.
Many U.S. companies would like rights to trade with Cuba, saying such commerce would be profitable and foster openness and political change in the country. Opponents, including many Cuban-American groups, contend that trade would only strengthen the Castro government.
Approving the visits to the United States is "a substantial step forward" by the Cuban government, said John Kavulich, president of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, a business-sponsored group in New York.
Johnstone said visits to the United States by Cuban entrepreneur groups were "unheard of" and would represent "a level of accommodation to the private sector that we certainly have been striving for almost a year to achieve."
Chamber chief executive Thomas Donohue visited Cuba last year, the first time that a chamber head had gone to Havana since Castro's revolution in 1959. After the trip, in which he met with members of Cuba's small private sector, he said the United States should foster ties with this group
whenever possible.
Cuba's economy remains largely state-run, but in certain sectors, such as restaurants and bicycle repair shops, the government allows free enterprise. Kavulich said there are about 150,000 private enterprises in Cuba today.
The Cubans would come here in groups of about 25, including members of the government-affiliated Cuban Chamber of Commerce. They would visit training facilities, restaurants and farms in programs set up by the U.S. Chamber.
The visits would follow ones to Cuba last March by 150 members of a U.S. private enterprise group, the Young Entrepreneurs Organization. Members of the Alexandria-based group met with Cuban officials and entrepreneurs in such fields as crafts, as well as with foreigners who are investing in
tourist-trade enterprises in Cuba.
Johnstone said yesterday that Cuban officials had also expressed willingness during this week's trip to talk with individual U.S. companies about settlement of claims relating to the Castro government's confiscation of U.S. property after it came to power four decades ago.
Officials indicated that settlements could come in advance of any eventual deal to normalize relations with the United States, Johnstone said.
The U.S. government has certified more than 5,900 U.S. companies and individuals as having claims against the Cuban government, amounting to about $1.7 billion. The Cuban government has conducted discussions with companies in the past over this issue, but with scant results.
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