Creole Choir of Cuba

Last Friday night we went to the Lotus World Music Festival where we saw this wonderful group, The Creole Choir of Cuba. They were by far the highlight of the festival. Their singing was beautifully soulful and though I couldn't understand the lyrics (they sing in the Creole language) the emotional content of their songs came through. At their performance, they announced that on Monday, the 26th, they would be doing a demonstration and answer questions at a special event held at our local public library. That's when I shot this photo (which I am back-blipping).

When I took this photo, I thought I had my camera set to available light and that I had the flash turned off. So, I was mortified when I snapped the picture and to my surprise, saw the flash illuminate the scene. I felt like I had done something terribly rude and wanted to crawl under my seat. I was sure that after their song, I was going to be reprimanded. Fortunately nobody said a word. I took a few pictures after this one using available light (with the flash definitely turned off) but they didn't turn out as well as this one.

Unfortunately, in this picture, you can't really see the four male members of the choir who are standing behind the women. During this event, the group only performed four songs. They didn't have their percussion instruments with them, so they were limited to songs that worked a cappella. Most of the session was question and answers that they fielded from the audience. This was done through a translator and unfortunately the translator that was provided was not a very good one. The translator refused to speak in to the microphone, she was very downbeat, and acted like she didn't care. Not only that, but she kept looking to someone off in the audience for advice on how to translate something, and she couldn't keep up with the conversation. She was a very poor choice.

In spite of the poor translator, we were glad we attended this event and got to see this wonderful group once more. They are currently on their first U.S. tour (our town was their second stop). If they perform in your city, or nearby, I would highly recommend that you make an effort to see them. You won't regret it. Mark and I both thought their concert was one of the best live musical performances we've seen (and we've both seen lots of concerts)!