In the continuing flow of folkloric Cuban music (Sierra Maestra, Eliades Ochoa, Pedro Luis Ferrer and others), add the group Saborit to your list of irresistible, rural virtuosos.  The back history on this recording is that the group drove in a tractor all the way from Manzanillo, which is near Guantanamo Bay, to Havana to meet Mo Fini of Tumi Records.  They waited three days for the producer to show and then regaled him with music that reduced him to tears.  Saborit consists of eight campesinos (peasants) who have played together since the early ‘80s.  Their maturity and experience certainly shows in these 13 tasty tracks, mostly sons and guarachas.  But amazingly, this is the group’s first commercial recording.

Son is that distinctively Cuban blend of African, Spanish and Haitian elements that coalesced in the northern part of the island, around Santiago, and spread via radio all over the island in the early 20^th century.  The singular cadence and chiming rhythmicity of son is the basis of modern styles such as mambo and salsa, as well as African popular genres from Senegal to Congo and beyond.  Saborit, named for the “king of Cuban country music” Eduardo Saborit (1912-1963), proves that the root style has lost none of its seductive charm.  Piano, bass and hand percussion propel these lightly drawn but trenchant grooves, and piquant call-and-response vocals are the focus of the arrangements.  But it is the splendid tres picking by Domingo Alcantara and Orlando Tejeda that really take one’s breath away.  Whether tangling at breakneck pace on the Conga “La Musica de mi Pais” or soloing freely on virtually every track, these pickers alone are worth the price of admission.  The tres is a paired-string lute characteristic of Cuban roots music, and it is played here with brilliant phrasing and seemingly effortless precision.

This venerable roots music is born of backbreaking labor in the sugar and tobacco industries, and thrives today in the artificial environment of Cuba’s political, economic, and cultural isolation.  There is much to lament there, and yet, the music evokes only joy and celebration, right up to the witty, improvised closer, “El Pregon de la Tumi,” a son to honor the record label that has at last brought these gifted rustics to the world. 

Contributed by: Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org