This intimate nightclub, a place where local Cubans always outnumbered tourists in the pre-1959 era, is located directly across from Havana’s famed Hotel Nacional. While researching my book on the 1940s and 1950s, I could not resist witnessing its late-night musical acts for myself. To my delight, this incredibly talented, elderly cabaret singer capped off the night with popular musical selections drawn from precisely that era. For more than thirty years after the Revolution (from the 1960s through the 1990s), the state forced into obscurity a majority of musicians known for cabaret-style performances and musical forms ranging from the bolero to jazz. Thanks to the state’s continuing dependence on tourist dollars in the post-Soviet age, many musicians were able to return to the stage and spend the last years of their lives soaking up the applause and global appreciation their talents deserved. Havana, 2013.
