HAVANA, CUBA -- The Grammy Award winning and world famous Buena Vista Social Club said adiós at Havana's Karl Marx Theater Sunday in the group's final show.
Five of the six Cuban surviving original stars were on the stage: Singer Omara Portuondo, singer and guitarist Elíades Ochoa, lutenist Barbarito Torres, trumpeter Manuel “El Guajiro” Mirabal and timbale player Amadito Valdés. The acclaimed musicians shared 24 songs with the public that came to enjoy the historic final show.
Nick Gold, owner of the British World Circuit record label which produced Buena Vista Social Club and together with Cuban musician Juan D’ Marcos González and American guitarist Ry Cooder helped make the group a global phenomenom, come to Havana to take part in the farewell.
Gold told NBC News in an exclusive interview that “possibly it is the end of an era” but added that “at the same time it is the beginning of different things for these artists”.
Buena Vista Social Club album won a Grammy Award and also a Billboard Latin Music Award in 1998.
Filmmaker Win Wenders’ acclaimed film on the group was nominated for an Academy Award for best documentary feature in 2000. The Cuban musicians and singers who became known from the recording sessions of the three original albums as well as other ones under the “trademark” group have toured all over the world, included the historic concert at Carnegie Hall and recently at White House.
