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2/ When i was in PR covering the storm's aftermath, the tragedy & devastation crowded out nearly everything--& yet the beauty & soul & depth of the people & culture was unavoidable. It is a tangible thing, tangible as any building, & @sebmodak gets at that in his piece, ...
3/ ... which starts with a vivid description of musicians rocking the traditional musical styles of bomba & plena in Santurce. Post-storm, this is ALL rebel music: all raging against the dying of the light, &c. No storm, no amount of neglect from DC is going to kill this.
4/ Anyhow, i'm a New Orleans person & am about to take my kids to the Mardi Gras, & so of course I'm nerding out & forcing them to learn the difference btw the clave & the bamboula beats that drive nola street music, & knowing the pain & sense of abandonment in both places...
5/ ...i was overcome with emotion reading seb's scene, of people simply dancing, drinking a cold one, hanging out... particularly on a MONDAY night, which, of course, rings in consonance w/ the spirit of the place where i grew up. And then......
6/ I flashed back to a moment when I was with photojournalist @dennismanuel1 , one of the great brave reporters doing the post-storm heavy lifting. We were finishing a day on half-devastated St. Croix, which we had helicoptered onto from San Juan...
7/ ...& we had somehow landed a room in a un-devastated hotel & had a second to just rest & talk. Because i'm a nerd like that, I asked Dennis to tell me five classic songs that spoke to the puerto rican experience. Here they are, for yr consideration/Spotify list inclusion...
8/ ... & all of them reminders of the resilience & hope & pain & straight-up genius of our fellow Americans & fellow humans in Puerto Rico:
9/ "Lamento Borincano," by the composer Rafael Hernandez, performed here by Marc Anthony, about a jibaro who comes to the city with stuff that nobody wants to buy. This arrangement is like a boricua stairway to heaven, opening softly, only to explode : https://www.google.com/search?q=lamento+borincano+marc+anthony&oq=lamento+borincano+marc+ant&aqs=chrome.0.0j69i57j0l4.5101j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 …
10/ "En mi Viejo San Juan," Trio Las Panchos. With this universal lament of the homesick & displaced: "Una tarde me fuí/hacia a extraña nación / pues lo quiso el destino / pero mi corazón / se quedo frente al mar..."https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-r5tmaNgIo …
11/ "Todo tiene su final," from the Nuyorican Willie Colon, w/ Hector Lavoe, with that typical nuyorican mix of urbane sophistication & straight rump-shaking... & in this case with a shape-shifting rhythm & jaw-dropping piano solo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFg-GLEGySI …
12/ "Un Verano en Nueva York," from El Gran Combo: Extolling all the good stuff about being puerto rican & ending up in NYC. Love how they suggest you get yr "amigos caprichosos" to show you around. Everybody needs a few of those:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hd0cl2d2ziU …
13/ & finally "Preciosa," also from composer Rafael Hernández, in an instrumental version full of both hope & saudade that speaks for itself. OK, Dennis. Mil gracias, compinche, & un saludo a los barrios, & feliz carnaval a todos....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v_NtoHriqc …
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