A Lost Chapter in the History of Orchestra Revé
The first-ever reissue of the 1971 De Habana a Lima Con la Orchestra Revé
Look at it long enough, and the cover of this 1971 release will conjure up the outline for a road movie: A large dance orchestra from Guantanamo, Cuba, is on the loose in Lima, Peru. It’s a routine thing for players working in the leading Cuban dance bands: Since performance opportunities in Cuba were limited (and not exactly lucrative), many of the bands became entrepreneurs abroad, touring Europe, Africa and South America on a regular basis.
The Lima tour promoter hires a bus and begins a street-level marketing campaign, ferrying the band to tourist areas and cultural landmarks. At each stop, the 15 (15!) members of Orchestra Revé, led by percussionist and composer Elio Revé, tumble out of the bus to charm passers-by with the sultry, hard-swinging sounds of changui. Young Peruvian lovers are enchanted; they follow the group from club to club. Word spreads and the shows are hot. The band — whose membership over the years included such luminaries as Chucho Valdes (of Irakere) and Juan Formell (of Los Van Van) — spends a day at a recording studio, knocking out infectious originals and familiar standards like “Guantanamera” for a Lima-based label, MAG, which was known to do one-off deals with Cuban bands. Copies are pressed but few leave Peru – the label sells mainly to people who want to remember the nights spent dancing. The platter’s scarcity puts Orchestra Revé on the radar of collectors; right now there’s one original copy for sale on Discogs, just $3000.00.
The story might end there were it not for Madrid-based VampiSoul, the reissue label known for finding rare gems from Africa, New Orleans and Brazil (another current VampiSoul reissue is Wanda Sa’s transfixing Vagamente).
Last week the label brought out the first-ever reissue of De Habana A Lima con la Orchestra Revé. It’s a gem, primarily because it feels very much alive – as though the band set up and simply romped through its live set. The percussion section’s intricate latticework is captured cleanly, the vocalists catch a range of moods, from dreamlike romantic reveries to crisp, neatly synchronized call-and-response exchanges in the choruses. The Revé sound at the time combined ancient and modern elements in clever ways: On “Yo No Te Olvido,” the tranquility of the bolero pulse is disrupted by a brash electric guitar, which engineers slick transitions between the bolero and a more agitated (quite possibly Santana-influenced) rhythm. Even something stock like “Guantanamera,” here titled “Guajira Guantanamera,” exudes an almost outsized exuberance – it’s easy to forget that the tune is a standard and these musicians had probably played it thousands of times. Nobody’s yawning this time.
In terms of repertoire, the only surprise is the closing track, “Dominga,” written by Brazilian singer/songwriter Jorge Ben Jor. Retaining the ceremonial vibe and processional tempo of the original, Orchestra Revé massages the recurring melody into a stirring and slightly mystical bit of last-set magic. Pay special attention to the guitar during the long improvised vamp at the end – the terse melodies echo Curtis Mayfield, the psychedelic pitch-bands evoke Arthur Lee and Love (among others). Yet it feels entirely natural, and, more remarkably, idiomatically appropriate for a Brazilian tune played by Cuban musicians in a Lima studio. Decades before anyone was talking about splinterized subgenres like “world fusion.”
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