La Caída by Gian Carlo Buscaglia

Drawing from multiple sources of musical inspiration, Buscaglia's original compositions reflect a full spectrum of musical traditions and styles, ranging from the lyrical Puerto Rican bolero of the 1930s to the edgy protest music of Latin America's nueva canción (new song) movement and the muscular dance rhythms of Afro-Caribbean salsa and bomba. Elements of North American swing, salsa, bolero, bomba, guaracha and classical music combine to produce a repertoire that is both strikingly original and astonishing in range. Featuring the explosive "La Caída" (The Fall) and the haunting "El Terror Monte En Aviones" (Terror Travels by Plane), La Caída is deeply moving and musically adventurous. Buscaglia's compelling vocals are backed by a 15-piece band, including Balaton, one of Boston's most accomplished Latin bands, Olga Kouznetsova and her string quartet, and Billy Novick on clarinet. Arranged by Julio Santillán (of Marta Gómez and Los Changos).

Gian Carlo Buscaglia has been performing as a guitarist and vocalist in Boston since the early 1980s, when he joined the street musician scene in Harvard Square, Cambridge. Largely self-taught, he was drawn to the acoustic pop styles popular in Latin America in the first half of the twentieth century. In 1991 Buscaglia co-founded Balaton, a Latin sextet interpreting a range of traditional, acoustic dance music from Puerto Rico and Cuba, in an older style recently introduced to American audiences by the Buena Vista Social Club. Balaton has performed at clubs and festivals throughout New England, opening for Marc Anthony in 1997 and for Eddie Palmieri at the Wang Center. Concurrently from 1990 to 1995, Buscaglia also performed with Los Pleneros del Coco, a sixteen-piece plena and bomba orchestra, on cuatro (a ten-stringed instrument similar to the mandolin) and vocals. A prolific and engaging performer on the local scene, whether solo, in duets, trios, quartets or with a full band, Buscaglia has delighted Boston Latin music fans with his lyricism, style and enthusiasm for twenty years.

With La Caída, his solo debut, Buscaglia reconnects with his first love in Latin music, nueva canción, the Latin American equivalent of the acoustic folk style exemplified by Silvio Rodriguez and Pablo Milanes of Cuba and Victor Jara of Chile. La Caída is politically engaged, smart and deeply poetic.

English translations.

Serenidad/Serenity

Serenity, where have you gone to hide?

We have not seen you around here for awhile,

you left one day without looking back

knowing the pain that was to come.

In truth your existence was not long,

in the history of men many will testify

that your life was always interrupted

by the insatiable thirst of evil.

Of course, a serene night of passion,

the caress a lover gives,

falling asleep in the arms of the beloved

will likely come to visit us.

I am not referring to that serenity,

rather to waking up encircled by peace,

not fearing that they will kill hope,

imprison innocence or bludgeon truth.

To sitting in the park to watch the daybreak

not fearing that they will bomb

talking with your friends about this and that

with the serenity that you will not meet your end.

I am sure you will come back some day

and the next day ... you'll go

persecuted by those who offer peace

with bloody hands ... serenity.

Dejala Entrar/Let it in

I have not come to preach

nor to complain about my life,

what has touched my soul

is shared as I sing.

Rationing the heart

or impounding nightmares

was always a feeble business

detached in a spiral.

My life ... will not play

hide-and-seek.

What is sadness good for

if it only brushes past you.

Let it in,

it will go away ... impatient.

To find itself lodging

with a heart in bloom.

Diego

He offers you a smile upon waking

like one who grants you life, for nothing.

Looking into his face, you can't help discovering

a ten year old's world leaves memories

that at thirty still move you.

It seems a lie, but you'll see

the tender kiss will change

to a bitter smirk

when adolescent rage is upon you.

A clumsy bull charge will mean more to you

than the cautious steps you take now,

you'll look me in the eye and say

"I'm going out with my friends, Papa."

He runs around the house never thinking

that his world of "Legos" will end

from one day to the next, raining

fervent feelings to explore.

My days of being a genius will remain behind

beside those of being a hero, already long gone.

Our days of being fast friends will find us still

riding our bicycles around the city.

El Trovador Atirdido/The Dazed Troubadour

From what I know of this friend I am amazed

how easily he let himself

be influenced by this conformist wave,

which led him to see himself in a new light.

With what fervor he used to sing to us,

about injustices and a better world,

now he swears that that was just a phase,

and that he finally knows the truth.

That the struggle and the street protests

are just a fuss that will change nothing,

That we are in the situation we are in

of our own fault and that is that.

That our beautiful native Americas

cannot think straight for their inferior diets,

that the whites of the European continent

think better, they ate more ham.

He tells me it is a question of genes

that is why we cannot make progress,

immobile phantom servants,

will be the only goal we can achieve.

Salma Hayek should not get too excited,

they will only give her whorish roles,

and Leguizamo, don't build up your hopes,

you'll always play the imprudent drug addict.

Chorus:

The disgrace of the troubadour

of the dazed troubadour,

I sing out loud

so as not to lose my way.

Rosa Sin Espinas/Rose Without Thorns

True that your eyes

generate love,

that lighthouse with its mantel

scares away the fear.

In dark nights I've learned from you

that in the dawn of this new love

giving it all is your bastion.

The goblin of time

transforms two beings

entangled with the verb to live

turning them into jasmine.

Deep grooves will help us

scale the wall of intimacy,

two bodies to the wind

today will blossom.

False that your lips

take pity on me,

my own lips despair

as they see you come.

It's right that the days not be always thus,

happiness always carries a bit of suffering

a rose without thorns, that's not living.

Rocio De Oscuridad/Dew of Darkness

The day that marked

the end of your stay,

your standoffish words

gave their last farewell.

Reasons were not lacking

for your departure,

those who praised you yesterday,

today doubt your love.

The passage of time in your hair

has gnawed away at your being

yet I doubt that it has made you

wiser in your old age.

What was it that hurt you,

who was it that so cursed you,

that your fragile glance

refuses all love?

Those who see you sparkling

with a thousand lights don't see

the clarity of Vieques

will never be extinguished.

I know, they were lost,

days of happiness.

Depleted uranium,

dew of darkness.

El Terror Monta En Aviones/Terror Travels By Plane

From among the shadows

from among whispers

they feed on the blood

of our lost dreams.

Our hope doesn't fade

The "war on terrorism,"

Well those who preach liberty

are the ones who pull the trigger.

They've resuscitated McCarthy

they glorify Reagan,

and Oliver North they've crowned

king of the evening news.

Today a camouflaged plane

dropped leaflets, and on them

the typewritten names

of a thousand accused.

They never learn from their mistakes,

they swear they never made them.

Today history is assaulted

in an abandoned lot.

Terror travels by plane

"this I already knew"

cries, drenched in blood,

a little girl in Baghdad.

La Caída/The Fall

All that goes up comes down

of that there's no argument.

From the smallest to the biggest

what goes up must come down.

You don't have to be a genius

and it is not by chance,

that the higher it goes up

the bigger the crash will be.

You can see already on the horizon

a monumental fall

with thousands of eyes shut

the blow will let you know.

Foolishness, arrogance

was your infernal banner

fluttering in the slide

of so vertical an ending.

Your cries will be in vain

no one will pick you up

today my own cries shout,

enough brutality!

Neither age nor love of mischief

will save you from this one

the bodies you use as scaffolding

will leap out of the way.

I recommend common sense

and a pinch of humility

a cupful of truths

and a cube of humanity.

It's the recipe of the day

the purgative of the week

you are your own worst enemy

not Osama or Saddam.

A Solas Juntos/Alone Together

Alone in your arms

I have come here,

to talk things over.

Let's stop pretending,

our everyday is already cruel suffering.

Our hands sweat

slippery love.

Time is witness

to our pain,

years have gone by

without resolution.

The cause of this shipwreck

was our rapid boarding.

Tottering between sorrow and pain

marked our inevitable destiny.

Today I find myself absent beside you,

beneath the blue cloak of our seas,

I drowned in the deaf deep

without ending our troubles.

Our lips dry,

saltpeter and sweat

our tears absent,

swallowed by the sun

a vessel adrift,

shipwrecked love.

La Musa/The Muse

Gusts of vanished ideas

confront me today,

demanding with closed fists

that I give them life again.

Dreams that in frustration

retraveled the alleys of the past,

and in the present forge

a somber future.

It's hard to rediscover

the caresses of the muse

who challenges me to a thousand duels,

well-armed and hooded.

In a dark room she dwelled yesterday,

the patched muse of my heart.

In closed worlds it's easy to avoid

taking the brush in hand and beginning.

Perfect dreams will mock

the wild horse of creating,

I give free rein to my imagination

with my soul at my shoulder I don't worry.

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