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Browse piano sheets by Buena Vista Social Club on Zen Virtual Piano. The making of the Buena Vista Social Club album turned on a change of plan: the Mali musicians could not make the trip at the last minute, so Gold and Cooder, already in Cuba, improvised. Cuba was then under a U.S. embargo and struggling through the economic effects of the 1991 post-Soviet collapse. A change of plan made in a country under embargo hints at how much the project leaned on improvisation. The musicians who did take part called themselves the Buena Vista Social Club, after a social club that the Cuban government shut down in the 1960s. With help from Juan de Marco GonzĂĄlez, Gold and Cooder gathered a group of old-timers. Some of them were active performers, among them the guitarist Eliades Ochoa, who at 50 was the youngest, GonzĂĄlez and the singer Omara Portuondo; others, such as the pianist Ruben Gonzalez and Compay Segundo, had mostly dropped out of sight. Pairing performers who were still active with players who had faded from public view suggests a project about rediscovery as much as about a new band. GonzĂĄlez found the semi-retired Ferrer, seventy years old, shining shoes for extra money on the streets of Havana, and signed him to the project. Finding Ferrer shining shoes on his daily stroll suggests that the search reached beyond the working musicians. Compay Segundo wrote Chan Chan in 1984, first dreaming the opening melody in his sleep and writing the lyrics afterward. Billboard's oral history recalls that it was the first song recorded for the album and that it was done in one take, with everyone realizing they had important work on their hands. It opens the album Buena Vista Social Club, released in September 1997, and became the group's signature song, bringing it international fame. A tune that arrived in a dream and ended up as the opening track gives one picture of how a private idea can travel. Released on 17 September 1997, the CD spread mostly by word of mouth, well past the usual reach of world music, and its sales topped one million copies; it earned a Grammy in 1998. Sales and a Grammy well beyond the usual audience for such records suggest music that travelled by recommendation as much as by promotion. Billboard ranks it among the late twentieth century's most unlikely crossover successes: senior Cuban musicians, playing traditional music, had reached listeners internationally. A stage musical telling the story of the original group premiered on Broadway in 2025. An album by older musicians that kept finding listeners and later reached the stage hints at music that outlasted its first season.
Browse piano sheets by Buena Vista Social Club on Zen Virtual Piano.
The making of the Buena Vista Social Club album turned on a change of plan: the Mali musicians could not make the trip at the last minute, so Gold and Cooder, already in Cuba, improvised. Cuba was then under a U.S. embargo and struggling through the economic effects of the 1991 post-Soviet collapse. A change of plan made in a country under embargo hints at how much the project leaned on improvisation. The musicians who did take part called themselves the Buena Vista Social Club, after a social club that the Cuban government shut down in the 1960s.
With help from Juan de Marco GonzĂĄlez, Gold and Cooder gathered a group of old-timers. Some of them were active performers, among them the guitarist Eliades Ochoa, who at 50 was the youngest, GonzĂĄlez and the singer Omara Portuondo; others, such as the pianist Ruben Gonzalez and Compay Segundo, had mostly dropped out of sight. Pairing performers who were still active with players who had faded from public view suggests a project about rediscovery as much as about a new band. GonzĂĄlez found the semi-retired Ferrer, seventy years old, shining shoes for extra money on the streets of Havana, and signed him to the project. Finding Ferrer shining shoes on his daily stroll suggests that the search reached beyond the working musicians.
Compay Segundo wrote Chan Chan in 1984, first dreaming the opening melody in his sleep and writing the lyrics afterward. Billboard's oral history recalls that it was the first song recorded for the album and that it was done in one take, with everyone realizing they had important work on their hands. It opens the album Buena Vista Social Club, released in September 1997, and became the group's signature song, bringing it international fame. A tune that arrived in a dream and ended up as the opening track gives one picture of how a private idea can travel.
Released on 17 September 1997, the CD spread mostly by word of mouth, well past the usual reach of world music, and its sales topped one million copies; it earned a Grammy in 1998. Sales and a Grammy well beyond the usual audience for such records suggest music that travelled by recommendation as much as by promotion. Billboard ranks it among the late twentieth century's most unlikely crossover successes: senior Cuban musicians, playing traditional music, had reached listeners internationally. A stage musical telling the story of the original group premiered on Broadway in 2025. An album by older musicians that kept finding listeners and later reached the stage hints at music that outlasted its first season.
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Common questions
Buena Vista Social Club is a group of veteran Cuban musicians that took its name from a social club the Cuban government shut down in the 1960s.
Compay Segundo wrote it in 1984, first dreaming the opening melody and writing the lyrics afterward.
It came out on 17 September 1997 and went on to win a Grammy in 1998 after selling over a million copies.
Billboard's oral history recalls that Chan Chan was the first song recorded, done in one take.