Congratulations to the Winners of the Cubadisco 2012 Awards

Para leer este artículo en español, haz click aquí

Cubadisco 2012 was officially dedicated to the guitar, but in some ways it was also the year of the retrospective.  Many of this year's nominees were recordings that looked back on the careers of the musicians.  It is also worth noting that based on the number of awards (14) that it was associated with, Colibri has emerged as a new powerhouse for Cuban recordings.  Bis Music was associated with at least 9 awards, and EGREM was associated with at least 7.  Several other labels were represented as well.  We mention this because some people still mistakenly believe that the Cuban recording industry is a monolith.  Here are some of the award results that will be of particular interest to Timba.com readers:  

CUBADISCO 2012 GRAND PRIZE:   Veinte Pianos, Música de Ernán López Nussa, various artists (Colibri).  Ernán has sometimes been underappreciated througout his career but had a very good year this time with 4 awards.  Veinte Pianos also won the awards for CD/DVD and Didactic Recording, and Ernán was recognized as Producer of the Year.  He is one of Bill Tilford's favorite Cuban Jazz artists. This is also Ernán's second Grand Prize - the first was in 2002 for his recording From Havana To Rio.

SPECIAL GRAND PRIZE:   Chucho's Steps, Chucho Valdés and the Afrocuban Messengers (Colibri). This is an excellent Jazz recording.  

SPECIAL AWARD: Mis 22 Años, NG La Banda (EGREM), 30 Años de Son 14,  Son 14 (EGREM),Sueños del pequeño Quin, Joaquín Betancourt (Colibri)

JAZZ:  Travesia, Iván Melón Lewis Quintet (Casa Limón).  (This actually won 2 awards.) Timba.com's Kevin Moore has written a lot about Melón, who has also made major contributioins to the genre of Timba. 

TESTIMONIAL  and FOLKLORIC MUSIC : Las Estrellas del folclor, Los Hermanos Arango (Bis Music). Los Hermanos Arango made a great impression on listeners during their tour of the United States a few months ago. 

TROVA FUSION:   Pi 3.14, Buena Fe (EGREM).  Buena Fe is a favorite of our own Timbera Mayor. 

ARCHIVAL MUSIC:   Origenes, Eduardo Ramos y Grupo Experimentación Sonora del ICAIC (Colibri)

LATIN MUSIC:  Mala, Haila (Bis Music).  Haila's solo project is a dance album that incorporates several different genres of popular music.  

*****CURRENT POPULAR DANCE MUSIC*****   Acabaito de nacer,  David Calzado y su Charanga Habanera (EGREM).  This recording does not break new ground musically, but it is a solid dance album, and one of the selections, the fusion number La Suerte,  also had a very popular video. In the near future, we will review both this recording and the other nominees for this category in more detail.  

permalink | Share