´Bolero es la vida`.Bolero is life. Gabriel Garcia Márquez.

One of my favourite boleros.

Cuban torch singer Blanca Rosa Gil, the Maria Callas of the bolero not only because of her dark, impressive voice but of the dramatic tension she is capable of conveying to her singing, is my beloved voice from Cuba along with priestess of music Omara Portuondo. Blanca is the voice of the extroverted, urban passion, Omara of the interiorised, earthy ceremony.

In the 50´s she performed with mambo orchestras in Cuba (debut in 1956 in the cabaret Ali Bar) and before the revolution she relocated in México. In 1955 she recorded in Venezuela the pasillo ecuatoriano ´sombras` which made her famous. The lyrics of one of her songs shocked the authorities and was banned from the cuban radio because of its ´immoral content` (No me vendo). Although some of her contemporaries had long visible carreers much of Blanca´s life after the 60´s remained a bit silent. Apparently, she lives married in Puerto Rico singing in Evangelist churches. Some YT videos show concerts in Miami with orchestrations inappropriate to her previous glory.

´Tortura`,composed by Orlando Brito, is a wonderful example of bolero tremendo, the one with a vivid presence of brass section-using an accentuated rythme of cha cha cha. It talks of an impossible, prohibited passion fact that explains the series of red traffic lights that my camera registered here in Athens downtown around various midnights in August 2009.

Enjoy

Tortura, es tortura mirarte,
Y no poder decirte lo que siento por ti.
Tortura es no poder besarte
Y estrecharte en mis brazos con loco frenesi.
Tortura es pensar que otros labios
Han detener tus besos que quiero para mi.
Tortura es no poder decirte lo mucho que te quiero,
Tortura, tortura es quando pienso que he de vivir sin ti. (less info)