The mystery behind one of the most famous songs of all time

BarcelonaI admit it. For years I didn't understand that Guantanamera, the famous Cuban song, referred to a woman in Guantánamo. It seems obvious, but sometimes it's hard to see things. In fact, almost everyone reading this article knows the song. But if I ask what the song is about, can you tell me?

It's the magic of music. Maybe we don't know what a song is about, but the rhythm hits and you move your body. Few places have been blessed with as much capacity for composing, singing, and dancing as Cuba. An island where music serves to celebrate and forget misery. Visiting the Casa de la Trova in Santiago de Cuba, I remember a grandmother who must have been 90 years old who, passing by on the street, looking very fragile, sensed there was a concert going on inside. She stood in the doorway and began to move her body: she danced so well.

The eastern part of the island is worth visiting. In Santiago, you have the Carnival Museum and the Casa de la Trova, a venue where musicians began to meet in the 1940s. In 1968, it became a cultural center open to musicians and residents who admire trova, bolero, and sueño, rhythms born here. Or visit the graves of Compay Segundo and Pepe Sánchez, the father of bolero, in the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery. Musicians who covered and helped make the music popular. Guantamera, one of the most famous Cuban songs. The most popular version adapts the verses of a poem by José Martí, the father of independent Cuba, a man buried in the cemetery itself. That opening line that says "I am a sincere man from where the palm tree grows, and before I die I want to pour out my soul's verses." It is a poem of his.

But who gave birth to the song? The Cubans. Many people claimed to be the father of Guantamera, but it was surely an evolution of the music of the streets of the city of Guantánamo at the end of the 18th century, when the parade Spanish was mixed with African rhythms. In the 1930s, musician Joseíto Fernández used the rhythm, which eventually became the song, to humorously analyze the news on the radio. It is said that one day he praised a girl from Guantánamo (hence the name), and provoked a jealous rage in his girlfriend. Thus, the song was named Guantanamera, but it's evident that it's a song dedicated to some anonymous woman from this city near Santiago. An inland village where they also have a trova house and the music plays every day, by the way. A city not far from the US military base.

Joseíto may have been the first to give the song its current form, but the rhythm already existed. And the lyrics are usually different. Some added a poem, some added flowers to a girl, others a touch of humor... even today it would be like our garrotines, songs with improvised lyrics and a thousand versions. The grace of Guantanamera No one can say for sure who wrote it. Or where it was first sung. And many people can't say exactly what it's about, because it mixes patriotism, friendship, and love. A good summary of what Cuba would become.

Recommendation for traveling to Cuba

Song: Guantanamera

Author: Compay Segundo

Year: 2000