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THE GAME OF MUSICAL HUGS BETWEEN CUBA AND PUERTO RICO

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For almost a century, musicians from Cuba and Puerto Rico have sat on the same stands, shared their songs, their music and the pleasure of living. The men and women who live in their neighborho­ods have in common the ease at good music, which can be called plena, bomba, son, or simply rumba and salsa, salsa and rumba: percussed sounds and hides, guitars named tres or cuatro, voices of all times that today are reunited. In Borinquén, Isidro Infante devoted himself to make the arrangemen­ts, select the repertoire and summon the necessary musicians. In Havana, José Manuel García had a perfect clear idea about the appropriat­e voices to complement the work. That is how one of the most interestin­g albums that have been produced in recent years was born and that involves musicians from these two nations. Bis Music, apart from being José Manuel´s headquarte­rs, knows as a record label that the "Russian roulette" effect of the music world can knock on any door today. That act of bravery deserves a record like this. Cuba and Puerto Rico: a Salsa musical embrace reconnects the musical genre that has identified the urban Caribbean for half a century with two of its fundamenta­l sources, and opens perspectiv­es for new production­s in which the interrelat­ions and mutual influences close a musical cycle that was once interrupte­d by causes beyond the musicians of these countries and others of the Caribbean. It is a tribute - a genuine act of cultural faith - to those who founded a tradition that does not stop in time, that survives the vagaries of these times. It is a hard music album, which "sounds big time" from the first to the last note, where men and women imprinted their souls, voices and feelings as if our musical future depended on it. An album like this, in times of musical and creative junk, commits itself unabashedl­y to those who know that transcende­nce lies in everyday life. Good taste still stands in these two islands. These men, who embrace each other, music in between like the two meanders that the Gulf Stream outlines when crossing these islands, know that.

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