Guajiro; chic Cuban country music : Raúl Paz unites multiple worlds, bringing together his Cuban identity with 15 years spent in Europe, and his long career with his new young fanbase. A musician of the town and the countryside, the singer-songwriter is releasing “Guajiro Chic”, a warm, political yet danceable new album.
Raúl Paz spent almost fifteen years in exile before returning home. Now he's back on the French music scene with a new album, Guajiro Chic; 11 tracks featuring maracas, tres guitar and minor keys, all wrapped up in the “Paz” style. Singer-songwriter Raúl Paz has been living with his family in a finca, The Finca Villaverde in the Viñales valley since 2009. A warm approachable man, he plants and organises his family's life independently, using solar energy and permaculture. He enjoys the skillful simplicity of his close neighbours, ‘poor but inspired agricultural workers and roots musicians’. The result is the energetic and romantic Guajiro Chic. Raúl Paz fine-tuned the lyrics, using double meanings, an art peculiar to artists in exile as much as to the malicia of the peasants.
After arriving in Paris in 1994 to study classical music, Raúl Paz spent fifteen years outside Cuba. During that period in France, Raúl built up an exemplary career, moving from club gigs to big theatres like the Olympia and the Zénith. In 2009, Raúl decided to return to his homeland. His return to Cuba marked an aesthetic turning point and created a new direction in Cuban songwriting. And because he spoke the truth in his songs, young people followed him. From now on, Raul Paz intends to move freely and share his life between Cuba and Europe. He has also set up a label (Coloma) to launch young Cuban talent and promote their music internationally.
Cuba si, Cuba no, Cuba siempre: it's all about sharing. Guajiro Chic, the culmination of years spent between the island and elsewhere, embodies the Cuban scene of today.
RAUL PAZ BIOGRAPHY
Guajiro, farmer and chic: Raul Paz unites multiple worlds, bringing together his Cuban identity with 15 years spent in Europe, and his career of almost 30 years with his new young fanbase. A musician of the town and the countryside, the singer-songwriter is releasing “Guajiro Chic”, a warm, political yet danceable new album.
Raúl Paz spent almost fifteen years in exile before returning home. Now he's back on the French music scene with a new album, Guajiro Chic, featuring 11 tracks featuring maracas and minor keys, all wrapped up in the Paz style.
Cuban singer, songwriter and composer Raúl Paz has been living with his family in Finca Villaverde in the Viñales valley since 2009. A warm approachable man, he plants and organises his family's life independently, using solar energy and permaculture. He enjoys the skillful simplicity of his close neighbours, ‘destitute and inspired workers on the land, roots musicians’. The result is the energetic and romantic Guajiro Chic. Raúl Paz fine-tuned the lyrics, using double meanings, an art peculiar to artists in exile as much as to the malicia of the peasants.
1994: the ‘special period’. There was nothing in Cuba; the dissolution of the Communist bloc and the USSR in 1991 had cruelly deprived the island of its support. Born in 1969 in the province of Pinar del Rio in the far west of Cuba, and raised in the remote village of San Luis, Raúl has the impatience of youth. Cuba cultivates a paradox: in this countryside exhausted by the State economy, the children of the Revolution (Raúl's parents, a pharmacist and biologist) and their descendants (Raúl, who studies Western classical music at the Higher Institute of the Arts) live together as equals. Together, they sing and dance to Guajira music.
Raúl Paz, he says, has thus acquired a good grounding passed on by his father, that of campesina music, from which the frondeurs of Cuban music draw their know-how, ‘without concern for mixing races, colours or social status - the Matamoros Trio, Bola de Nieve, Beny Moré and Polo Montanez, for example’.
Raúl was a gifted student and was offered a scholarship to the Schola Cantorum in Paris. In 1994, he found himself on the banks of the Seine. Here he found fans of Cuban music, salsa dancers and lovers of son, rumba and trova. He was studying classical music, but was drawn to it by economic necessity and a love of the stage. Here he was, introduced to his own country, playing at the New Morning or the Hot Brass, learning its popular music so well and so quickly that he invented his own musical identity ‘a mixture of tradition and modern sounds’ that attracted young people. During the fifteen years he spent in France, Raul built up an exemplary career, moving from clubs to the Olympia and the Zénith.
In 2009, Raúl decided to return to his homeland, to the countryside. ‘I'm fed up with the city, the business, the rush, the competition, the speed, the formatted music’. From his country retreat, he composed albums, music for ‘telenovelas’ for national television, and produced an album for Florent Pagny (Habana, 2016). At the end of his confinement, he triumphed at Havana's Teatro Marti ‘with a classical repertoire’. His return to Cuba marked an aesthetic turning point and created the new face of Cuban song. And because he spoke the truth in his songs, young people followed him. From now on, Raul Paz intends to move freely and share his life between Cuba and Europe. He has also set up a label to launch young Cuban talent and promote their music internationally.
Cuba si, Cuba no, Cuba siempre: it's all about sharing. Guajiro Chic, the culmination of years spent between the island and elsewhere, embodies the Cuban scene of today.