5.0 out of 5 stars
El Primero Compay Segundo, July 20, 2010
This review is from: Compadre Again (Audio CD)
At the turn of the 21st Century, I couldn't get enough of the Buena Vista Social Club musicians. I bought seemingly every spinoff disc I could by the various participants, including several titles by one of the greatest ever Cuban male guitarist/vocalists, Compay Segundo. This year's gloriously warm Maine summer has gotten my tropical blood boiling once again, so I recently ordered several collections from the Cuban Essentials series on the Escondida label, especially when I saw how inexpensively they were selling from vendors in the Marketplace. "El Compadre Again" has to be the best of the four discs I bought from this series. Most of this material seems to be culled from three sessions, produced in 1974, 1985 and 1990 respectively, though there is one track that sounds like it is from the early 1950s. What surely must be the original version of "Chan Chan" is presented here, along with many other memorable numbers that hold their own with anything Compay revisited on later recordings after the success of Buena Vista Social Club. In fact, after only a couple of listens I think I like these earlier recordings better than his Nonesuch discs because he is younger and sharper on guitar -- the man was in his 90s after all on those later CDs. In all, I would have to rank this Compay Segundo disc my primero choice.
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