Artists and bandsBuena Vista Social Club
The 1997 album grew from Havana recording sessions with musicians from different parts of Cuba.
A song in a Havana studio
In 1996, musicians gathered at Havana’s EGREM studio to record the sessions that became Buena Vista Social Club. Among the songs was “Chan Chan”, a composition by Francisco Repilado, known as Compay Segundo. The album appeared the following year.
The song names places in eastern Cuba rather than Havana. Its characters Juanica and Chan Chan sift sand beside the sea; the refrain sets out a sequence of towns. Compay Segundo’s song arrived in the capital with musicians whose histories and repertoires reached beyond it.
The project took its name from a historic Havana social club. It was not a recording made in that old club: EGREM’s studio provided the room for the 1996 sessions. On “Chan Chan”, Compay Segundo and Eliades Ochoa share the recording, bringing an eastern Cuban song into the Havana album.
Songs