An ideological battle is being waged over Cuba’s communist government between musicians in Havana and Miami, with political slogans set to reggaeton, salsa and rap.
The latest volley is to be fired today when hip hop duo Gente de Zona is to perform, live for the first time, their YouTube hit Patria y Vida in Miami.
The title of the track — a collaboration with other Cuban artists based in Florida and at home — translates as “fatherland and life,” a spin on the slogan Patria o Muerte (fatherland or death) coined by the late communist leader Fidel Castro in 1960.
Photo: AFP
The tune is a no-holds-barred critique of the country’s six-decade-old communist government, rattling off a long list of grievances about poverty, repression and misrule.
“It is over,” declare the singers. “We are not afraid.”
Recorded in Havana and Miami and launched on Feb. 16, the song has unleashed the battle of song.
Cuban state television declared it a “campaign against Cuba” and soon started hosting its own pro-government musical fare.
Florida, home to the largest group of Cubans living abroad, is across the ocean just 145km from Cuba.
“Patria y Vida came about because Cuba is in a critical moment,” Randy Malcolm of Gente de Zona said.
Malcolm and his singing partner Alexander Delgado have come under pressure from other exiles in their adopted Miami to use their public profile to speak out against the Cuban government.
“There is repression like never before. There is no freedom of expression. Human rights are not respected,” Malcolm said.
“Many people who are here [in Florida] fighting the dictatorship have never done so before. We, too, didn’t have the courage” until now, said Malcom, who left Cuba for the US in 2013.
The Cuban government launched a musical counterassault.
State TV has on repeat a music video entitled Patria o Muerte, por la vida (“fatherland or death, for life”) featuring artists “committed to the Cuban Revolution.”
In Miami, rapper El Micha released Cuba Cries Freedom, while in Havana youngsters dressed in police uniforms sing: “I won’t sell myself for a car and a mansion.”
In the cradle of rumba and kingdom of salsa, artists have often defended the revolution, and its leaders in song.
Since the 19th century “a political point of view” has been present in Cuban music, said music historian Emir Garcia.
He is not convinced that the recent explosion tit-for-tat melodies would sway anyone new.
“In three months it will be over. Even if there are 60 more songs, people will forget. People are not interested in this,” he said.
The heated musical war shows the growing divide between Cubans at home and US-based exiles — forcing Cuban artists to pick a side, said Havana-based singer Israel Rojas.
His duo, Buena Fe, has released a song called The Strength of a Country — a tribute to Cuba’s quest for a homegrown COVID-19 vaccine.
“In times of radicalization, looking away and sticking your head in the sand is truly a pity and sad, because you end up on the side of the aggressor” — the US, Rojas said.
Those criticizing Cuban-based artists were doing so from an “erroneous reading of the cause of our poverty, from the comfort of a full refrigerator,” he said, wearing a T-shirt with the words: “Proud to be Cuban.”
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