The GRAMMYs & Castro's Official Artists
------ Original Message ------
Received: Wed, 27 Aug 2003 06:49:28 AM CDT
From: "ABIP"
To: "abip usa"
Subject: The GRAMMYs & Castro's Offi cial Artists
Reprinted from www.LaNuevaCuba.com
Also published by FOR FREEDOM & JUSTICE GROUP
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ForFreedomandJustice
Will be appearing soon at www.AmigosPais-Guaracabuya.org
THE GRAMMYS AND CASTRO'S OFFICIAL ARTISTS
By Agustín Blázquez - ABIP.USA@verizon.net
and Jaums Sutton
La Nueva Cuba
August 25, 2003
Those who say that art and politics should not be mixed are right,
but don't bother discussing that with the owner of the biggest plantation 90
miles south of Florida.
Back in the beginning, June 1961, Castro boomed in a menacing tone
for all the Cuban intellectuals and artists to hear, "WITHIN THE REVOLUTION
EVERYTHING, AGAINST THE REVOLUTION, NOTHING!"
The statement might be considered plagiarism since fascist Italian
dictator Benito Mussolini had already said "With the state everything, without
the state, nothing!"
So much for Castro's artistic creativity. But, welcome a new,
succulent, tropical concoction, some sort of a "Cuba Libre" made of equal
parts, or maybe not equal parts --it really doesn't matter-- of Fascism and
Communism whirled together in Castro's blender. Cheers!
With that ominous dictum began Castro's mixing of politics with
the arts: Cuba's artists who wanted to continue being artists had to at least
pretend 100% loyalty to the revolution to become "official artists."
The then Minister of Culture, Armando Hart, following Castro's
dictum said, "Art is a weapon of the revolution."
As Castro's heroes, Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin and other Fascist
and Communist tyrants did, Castro sent artists who refused to become his
puppets to prison, like the late writer Reinaldo Arenas, and to the UMAP
concentration camps, like the late actor Rafael De Palet and psychiatric
institutions, like musician Julio Vento Roberes. Others became officially "non
existing" like the late playwright Virgilio Piñera, while the rest, among
them singer Celia Cruz and writer Guillermo Cabrera Infante, went into exile.
Cuban Americans, victims of Castro's regime, understand very well
that arts and politics march together in Cuba. It is an unavoidable part of
the reigning Fascist/Communist system imposed upon the Cuban people. That's
why the protests of the presence of Castro's official artists at the GRAMMYs
in the U.S., just as the Jewish protests of the Nazi artists and black
Americans protest the presence of racist artists. It is part of the freedom we
have to peacefully protest. But in the case of Cuban Americans it is not
accepted when they protest something as blatant as this situation. Most of the
time they are maligned by the U.S. media because of it.
While Castro's official artists get GRAMMY nominations,
opportunities to sell and promote their CDs as well as very good press in the
U.S., the real (and free) Cuban artists in exile suffer discrimination. The
exile artists are free to be even more Cuban than the ones Castro is exporting
who have to do his bidding. Castro's official artists are sent because they
support his principles and because they bring him money that helps him stay in
power.
An exiled Cuban singer with a long career whose name I cannot
mention said, "Castro has his artists under his control, even the ones who
came to exile recently as well as the ones who defected a few years ago,
because they enter the competition under the auspices of the Cuban regime
which has facilitated their contracts with international recording labels."
Most of the profits from these contracts go to the Castro regime, not to the
recording artists.
So, the free Cuban artists in the U.S. do not have the benefit of
a big foot already in the door, a contract and the promotion afforded by a
recording label. They also don't have the agents to promote them all over the
world as the Castro's official artists do, therefore they cannot compete. "The
result is, we cannot compete even if we were nominated. The public does not
know us. Actually, the ones who control the recording market in Los Angeles
and even in Miami and the television do not let us in. And because we don't
have a recording label, they don't listen to us."
But the recordings of Castro's official artists are played on the
radio, because the international recording labels can afford the pervasive
payola to those stations all over the U.S. That's why their recordings become
known and popular and then gain the notoriety necessary to support a GRAMMY
nomination.
It is time to understand once and for all that these privileged
official artists are not independent; they work for Castro's government.
We must realize that even in the U.S. they are hostages of Castro
as well as of the foundations and organizations that sponsor them. They have
their families in Cuba and are aware of Castro's retribution practices. The
U.S. press treats this scheme with superficiality by giving the impression
that Castro is opening up despite the fact that much of what Castro exports is
specifically designed to give that false impression.
The press is again helping Castro win his public relations
campaign by representing the exiled community as intolerant when they protest
the presence of Castro's official artists at the GRAMMYs in Miami or in any
other venue in the U.S. (but there are no accusations of intolerance to Nazi
art). As a result of this biased portrait, they are widening the empathy gap
between uninformed Americans and Cuban exiles, therefore creating division,
just as the Maximum Con Artist (Castro) planned, you fools!.
The exiles have no quarrel with these official artists. They are
just pathetic victims of the tragedy Cuba has been suffering for 44 years. The
quarrel is with the deception by the press, which refuses to tell it like it
is.
This exiled Cuban singer says, "If Miami won't allow artists
representing the Ku Klux Klan or the Nazis, why should we allow Castro's
artists here?" I commend Emilio Estefan and Willie Chirino for protesting the
presence of Castro's official artists performing at the GRAMMY Awards show
this year in Miami.
The Bush administration, who recently has gotten in a lot of
trouble with the Cuban American voting community for following Clinton's
immoral policies toward Cuba, finally acted showing some principle. The
Administration has refused to issue visas to come to the GRAMMYs to Castro's
official artists who signed an April 19, 2003 anti-American document
supporting of the recent executions of three black men and incarceration of 75
pro-democracy activists in Cuba.
The document was signed by the famous ballerina Alicia Alonso,
Miguel Barnet, Leo Brouwer, Octavio Cortázar, Abelardo Estorino, Roberto
Fabelo, Pablo Armando Fernández, Roberto Fernández Retamar, Julio García
Espinosa, Fina García Marruz, Harold Gramatges, Alfredo Guevara, Eusebio
Lea;, José Loyola, Carlos Martí, Nancy Morejón, Senel Paz, Amaury Pérez,
Graziella Pogolotti, César Portillo de la Luz, Omara Portuondo (the singer of
the Buena Vista Social Club), Raquel Revuelta, Silvio Rodríguez, Humberto
Solás, Marta Valdés, Chucho Valdés and Cintio Vitier.
Castro has even requested U.S. visas for about 100 of his
"musicians!" I hope that troop is not allowed to set their boots on American
soil.
I don't know what will it take for the Americans to be more
sensitive to the tragedy going on in Cuba for 44 years and to listen to the
victims of that regime. I guess it is very difficult to get our message across
since Cuban Americans are surrounded by the insurmountable wall of censorship
imposed by the U.S. media, which in reality is not as free as they claim to
be. So far they have refused to tell the story of Cuba as it is.
This attitude is exemplified by all the blatant misinformation
that The New York Times still is shamelessly publishing about Cuba. They
certainly ought to apologize for it.
But for sure, no matter what they say in their shallow reports,
the reality is very different. In Castro's Cuba politics and arts have to hold
hands very tightly together. If you are not at the service of the revolution,
you will not have any future as an artist in Cuba or abroad.
(c) ABIP
*Agustín Blázquez, Producer/director of the documentaries
COVERING CUBA, CUBA: The Pearl of the Antilles, COVERING CUBA 2: The Next
Generation & COVERING CUBA 3: Elian presented at the 2003 Miami Latin Film
Festival. Author with Carlos Wotzkow of the book COVERING AND DISCOVERING and
translator with Jaums Sutton of the book by Luis Grave de Peralta Morell THE
MAFIA OF HAVANA: The Cuban Cosa Nostra.
Lillian Martinez
PO Box 293
Round Rock Texas USA 78680-0293
512 246-2597 - Voice
512 246-1478 - Fax
Copyright© 2003
Agustín Blázquez
and Jaums Sutton
All rights reserved
Created - 9/12/03
Revised - 8/15/05
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