Ibrahim Ferrer Buenos Hermanos (special edition)

World Circuit will release a very special edition of Buena Vista vocalist Ibrahim Ferrer’s Grammy-winning second solo album ‘Buenos Hermanos’ on 28th February. Originally released in 2003, ‘Buenos Hermanos’ was acclaimed as an audacious and assured album firmly rooted in tradition, whilst expanding the horizons of 21st Century Cuban music with its varied repertoire and modern sound.

Producer Ry Cooder has now gone back to the original tapes to re-mix the whole album, adding four previously unheard tracks from the original album sessions to a brand new sequence, creating a completely reimagined ‘Buenos Hermanos’.

“It’s better than ever, if I may say,” comments Ry on the new mixes. “We went back into the session tapes and found songs that were overlooked for some reason, and you’re going to be as thrilled as I am. We’ve really polished it up and improved it and expanded it, it sounds almost brand new. There’s one thing for sure: we need something good, something beautiful in these days and times.”

The reimagined version of the album also features refreshed cover artwork, featuring an alternative photograph from the original album shoot by Christien Jaspars. As well as digital formats, the release will be available as a CD casebound book and 180g heavyweight double vinyl, with both packages including English and Spanish lyrics, and a new foreword from Ry Coode

Having retired from nearly 40 years of performing, Ibrahim Ferrer was shining shoes in 1996 when he was approached by Afro-Cuban All Stars’ band leader Juan de Marcos González to sing on the sessions that would become the original Buena Vista Social Club album. The record was released to phenomenal reception the following year, going on to sell over 8 million copies and catapulting Ferrer and his fellow musicians to international fame.

‘Buenos Hermanos’ followed Ferrer’s first solo album ‘Buena Vista Social Club Presents Ibrahim Ferrer’ and was hailed at the time as a selection of fresh takes on classic songs and thrilling examples of the romantic ballads and boleros for which Ferrer was justly famed. It won the Grammy for Best Traditional Tropical Latin Album that year.

The handpicked core band is an unusual ensemble that combines the Cubans Orlando ‘Cachaíto’ López (bass) and Manuel Galbán (electric guitar, piano and organ), Ry Cooder (guitars), the esteemed Chucho Valdés (piano) and Miguel ‘Angá’ Díaz (congas). Additional inspired flavouring comes courtesy of accordionist Flaco Jimenez, the gospel-charged voices of the Blind Boys of Alabama and the ambient trumpet of Jon Hassell.

It is a record full of variety and unique energy - there’s the free-flowing improvisation ‘La Música Cubana’, composed spontaneously in the studio by Ferrer and Chucho Valdés, the explosive rhythms of ‘Hay Que Entrarle a Palos a Ése’ with Galbán’s time-warp organ solo, and the gritty guitars of Cooder and Galbán on ‘No Tiene Telaraña’. The two guitarists are juxtaposed to strikingly different effect against Demetrio Muñiz’s orchestral arrangement on ‘Mil Congojas’. There’s the playfulness that Flaco Jimenez’s accordion brings to ‘Naufragio’ and the charming cha cha cha ‘Como El Arrullo de Palma’ and the pop sensibility of the lovely ‘Boliviana’, which Valdés originally wrote for Irakere in the 1970s.

Unearthed from the original album sessions and previously unreleased until now, ‘Mujer’ is an emotional performance from Ibrahim of this famous bolero, written by the legendary Mexican musician and songwriter Agustín Lara. ‘Ojos Malvados’ (“Evil Eyes”), composed by Cristina Saladrigas (one of the few women in the early days of traditional Cuban ‘trova’), is another elegant bolero that has become part of the repertoire of some of the greatest Cuban musicians, from son and bolero giants Trio Matamoros to Barbarito Díez. The fourth track to be added to the original album, ‘Me Voy Pa’ Sibanicú, is a ‘guaracha,’ a style connected to the Cuban son that reflects the tremendous street humour of cities like Ibrahim’s hometown of Santiago de Cuba, and which is usually spiced with double meanings and satire.

Ferrer brings to these songs not only his ripe and long-standing vocal mastery, but a confidence and self-assurance that, according to Cooder, puts him up there alongside such all-time giants of Cuban music as Ferrer’s own personal hero, Beny Moré.

“These are songs that make me feel younger,” said Ferrer at the time. “I have put my deepest feelings into them and it’s my way of giving something back to my listeners and thanking them for their support. I enjoy feeling there is something inside what I am singing.”

‘Buenos Hermanos [Special Edition]’ Tracklisting:

1. Boquiñeñe

2. Música Cubana

3. Boliviana

4. Me Voy Pa’ Sibanicú*

5. Buenos Hermanos

6. Mil Congojas

7. Ojo Malvados*

8. Guaguancó Callejero

9. Hay Que Entrarle a Palos a Ése

10. Perfume De Gardenias

11. Como El Arrullo De Palma

12. Mujer *

13. No Tiene Telaraña

14. Ven Conmigo Guajira*

15. Naufragio

16. Fuiste Cruel

17. Oye El Consejo