A few weeks ago, the 2nd International Colloquium Patria, organized by the Union of Cuban Journalists (UPEC in Spanish), was held in Havana, with the participation of numerous speakers from different parts of the world. From alternative media, political organizations and social activists, extraordinary voices proposed and made reality ideas to counteract the hegemonic policy of the North as the only credible and possible narrative for our peoples.
A musical look at this complex environment was proposed by Israel Rojas, composer and leader of Buena Fe, around a not inconsiderable idea for these times: the creation of one or more record labels of the South in which the hundreds of projects emerging in our region would have a place. On this subject, I emphasized in my previous column, almost with total similarity, the musical colonyism that has been imposed on us from the triumphalist discourse, and if we were to add Israel's initiative, we could then have safer havens in times of storms. It is utopian, of course, but we should not dismiss this idea, quite the contrary: to assume it as a completion from the premises of the phonographic industry would be an ideal step towards the dreamed Latin American cultural integration.
Linking the distribution of discographic materials in our countries is an arduous task, and the main obstacle is the depreciation of the physical disc market, as well as its accelerated and almost total demise. At the same time, entertainment transnationals -mainly based in Miami- inject millionaire budgets to their productions in order to keep on making our most authentic musical expressions increasingly cheaper.
If we were to think about how to win spaces, to conquer audiences from the current rules of the hegemonic market, it is clear that we are facing a monopolizing monetary scheme as a catalyst and regulator of a whole mechanism of continental musical validation.
Obviously, in our case, we have the singularity of being a region of rhythms and projects that can be widely disseminated and consumed in a real and coherent way, without falling into caricatures for an audience that is sold a sound postcard or a picturesque maraca as a souvenir. But yes, it takes money, and a lot of it, to assume the reins of a musical distribution focused on our own cultural needs, in which those referents can also compete with that gigantic machinery of banality.
Seeing how a good part of our region can dance or know the best salsa, rock or pop bands over a song of spite in the face of a millionaire divorce, should be a reason for regional discographic concertation.
Promoting more continental singer-songwriters would be a good exercise so that the audiences would look more to our South, and not so much to the North where cheap musical merchandise is almost always canned and resold. Promoting choral and symphonic movements in our common area, where even the language plays in our favor, would also be ideal to be less discriminated against and to make our theaters flourish more. A difficult task, but not impossible.
Translated by ESTI
