Customer Reviews

Cuba! / Manuel Barrueco

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Manuel Barrueco is without a doubt one of the top 3 classical guitar players in the world. (I have been to several performances by the man and outside of fellow guitarist David Russell who would make the top 3, many times I have felt that Barrueco is #1 for our times) On this album, one can find many different sides to Cuban art music, most of them neglected for so long. Highlights of this great album are Ernesto Lecuona's
"Danza Lucumi", a beautiful prelude by Leo Brouwer, a most mesmerizing and memorable rumba-based composition in Enrique Ubieta's "New York Rush"; Leo Brouwer's "Rito de los Orishas" will send shivers down your spine in its first section and in the section one will find many beautiful Afro-Cuban melodies and rhythms. Like most of Brouwer's music and with all good music in fact, one must listen to it with complete focus and attention or else one will miss the boat completely. An elegant and powerful album from possibly the best classical guitarist of our times. 5 stars

At last a maestro of the guitar releases a music CD expressing the other side of Cuban music that we seldom see. He brings to light the wonderfully expressive music of otherwise little heard contemporary composers. We constantly hear "salsa" and jazz influences in Cuban music, but seldom the serious, more elaborate side that also exists. This CD bridges that gap and gives a feel for the other side.

This delightful album is a wonderful introduction to a body of overlooked compositions and composers. These works are engaging, melodic, and atmospheric. The recording again demonstrates why Barueco is the most interesting classical guitarist performing today. He consistently animates works to a level seldom achieved. Anyone weary of the usual classical guitar repertoire is well advised to seek out this recording.

I have never heard any one played latin american music like M.Barrueco.Danzas y Cantos was great and Cuba is inexplicable.I have been playing guitar for seven years and most of the songs I play are latin american.I learned very ýmportant things about how to interprite latin music by M.Barruecos recordings.I think M.Barrueco should play JORGE CARDOSO's transcriptýon and composýtýons,I would realy like to listen them from M.Barrueco.I am going to join to the academic year at the Royal Northern College of Music next september,I would be most greatful ýf M.Barrueco could reply me about what is he going to do on next year between july 99 until july 2000. Thank you very much for recording CUBA.

The combined pizzicato in the bass with melody in La Comparsa is worth the record. Some reviewers called this record dull, or misleading in the title. I disagree: it's a soft spoken, calm and rithmic masterpeace full of old and new Cuban music.
I guess the disappointment comes because It's not a popular music record, meaning Benny Moré, son, Trío Matamoros, Buena Vista or Celia Cruz, it's a solo classical guitar CD by one of the greatest players of all time. More than enough for me.

Manuel Barrueco propone un fantástico viaje por Cuba a partir de un disco integrado por composiciones de compositores nacidos allí. Sonata, de José Ardévol es de una exiquisitez sin precedentes y la sensibilidad interpretativa de Canción Triste es magistral.
Imprescindible.

As a teenager growing up in South Florida in the mid 50's I used to listen to music on Cuban radio stations. It was very rhythmic and upbeat or romantic, languid and sensual. I bought this album because I heard the artist interviewed on Performance Today and loved what he played. But that piece and 2 others by the same composer are the ONLY compositions I like on this CD. The rest is not music but guitar "sounds" which could have come from a 20th century composer anywhere in the world. I do not like atonal music or that which does not have a melodic line SOMEWHERE in it. So that leaves me with 5 minutes of playable music out of 65 minutes. I forced myself to listen to the entire CD but doubt I will ever play it again. It certainly did NOT bring back memories.

WHATEVER OTHERS MAY THINK OF HIS MUSICAL TALENT, TO MY EARS BARRUECOS MUST BE THE MOST BORING GUITARRIST IN THE WORLD. NO MUSICAL PALETTE, NO FLAIR, TOTALLY ANEMIC. I MADE THE MISTAKE OF BUYING THREE OF HIS RECORDS, 2 PIAZZOLAS AND CUBA. RECYCLED OLD HORSES, I AM ONLY KEEPING ONE AND TWO ARE GOING FOR XMAS GIFTS TO PEOPLE I DO NOT LIKE VERY MUCH. HOWEVER, THERE IS A BRIGHT SIDE: THE BEST SLEEPING AID THIS SIDE OF MARTINIS!

None of the music here seems to come out of Cuba as a necessity, if you catch my meaning. Any Latin American composer could have turned out most of what is on this disc. On the other hand, the fact that all the composers are Cuban is reason enough, I suppose, to justify the title of this CD. Yet all this is beside the point. It is the music that should concern us. While none of it is strikingly original or even tuneful, there are moments of beauty, now brooding, now not quite as melancholy. But I cannot see myself wanting to give any of it close second hearings; although I will play it as ambient music and as a contrast to the more "popular" Giuliani, De Falla, Sor, et alia that usually are represented on collections such as this.

I am agree with the music fan from Scottsdale, AZ. This CD is a big Disappointment! The CD does not bring back any memories. It is only a nice picture with the Cuba name on the front. It is only a marqueting idea that probably will work just for few month but once you open and play it you will get very, very disappointed. I forced myself to listen to the entire CD and I won't play it again.