Have you ever been driving a F-150 through the desert at dawn? Watching the full moon four times bigger as you watch it in the city? It doesn't matter, if you can drive a car you may have your perfect driving moment and you may still be keeping to yourself, because it is kind of a zen experience you don't want to ruin by sharing it with a stranger.
Anyway, I should thank first Stephen King for introducing me to the then unknown pleasures of driving at the tender age of 13. I read his best-seller Christine, and boy did my life change after that. I thought I could relate a lot to Arnie Cunningham, who always had to put up with tons of misery until he found a little happiness and then his life force would be taken from him for good.
But he was driving the perfect car: a red-white '58 Plymouth Fury. Made just for him. Oh, did I tell you before how much I like rock 'n roll? Every time I see a fiftysomething Chevrolet Bel-Air, a Pontiac or an old Studebaker, I remember immediatly:
From the Beach Boys to the Beatles to Jan and Dean and a very long et cetera, driving a cool car and rock 'n roll music belong together. But not anymore. In the name of political correctness and enviromentalism, we have to endure this:
Driving a car won't be as fun as it used to be. Thanks for nothing, GM.
I'm still looking for somethin' else. But never mind, today is the best Beatles Video Lip-sinch-You-Tube-Video feature ever! Something else is coming, you just watch out!
sipmacrants! is still celebrating. Today Dr. sipmac's special guest will be Dominic Ambrose, with a spectacular post about a groundbreaking song of the 80's: El Gran Varón/The Big Man. Thank you very much, Mr. Ambrose by letting Dr. sipmac repost your article here again on sipmacrants! Without further ado, Dr. sipmac proudly presents: El Gran Varon: Willie Colon’s story of Simon is 20 years old Twenty years ago, one of the great New York salsa artists, Willie Colon, released an album containing what would become an enduring classic of salsa music, as powerful for its message as for its fantastic style, the story of Simon, “El Gran Varon.” Willie Colon (pronounced Colón) was born in New York City in 1950, and became a headliner at venues like the Corso Ballroom and the Cheetah when he was still in his early twenties. Throughout the 1970s and 80s he built up a loyal following for his work with the Fania All Stars and artists like Hector Lavoe. This album, entitled “Top Secret” was his last for the Fania label, and it features Colon with his trombone and distinctive vocals, and his own orchestra, Legal Aliens. The song “El Gran Varon” was not thought of as a potential hit, or at least it was not initially presented as a candidate for such, perhaps because of the risky territory it covered. It was a song about AIDS and the isolation that homophobia and stigmatization bring.
Salsa is a powerful style, capable of expressing a great variety of emotions with its wide repertoire of rhythms, dynamics and tonalities. It has a basic structure but many origins, from African rhythms, to the clubs of Puerto Rico, Cuba, New York and the Caribbean as a whole. The New York style, of which Willie Colon was a leading exponent, was nurtured in its formative years in the jazz world of Manhattan in the forties and fifties (that is, the West Forties and the Nineteen Fifties), where jazz bands and salsa bands would sit in on each other’s gigs. Improvisation and idiosyncratic flair were highly prized elements there, as evidenced by the elaborate solos and characteristic free-form piano bridges.
Willie Colon’s trombone was a part of this tradition but in this song, his innovation is so much more: in the words of a timely, modern and tragic story within the framework of a traditional salsa structure. To my knowledge, he was the first well known artist, singing either in Spanish or in English, to allude so specifically to the horrifying epidemic that was devastating young victims in cities like New York, San Francisco, Miami and San Juan. It was not without its risks. If Caribbean culture has a famously vibrant gay element to it, quite apparent to those with even a passing acquaintance with the culture, it is kept in line and overshadowed by a virulent sense of honor that insists on presenting a macho image to the world. Add to that the stigma attached to this disease, not only in Puerto Rican culture, but in American culture as a whole during that period. It all could have very easily damaged Colon’s career.
Yet, he believed in this song, and with his distinctive metallic tenor voice and the perfect timing and sound of his superb orchestra, Willie Colon renders an unforgettable performance. El Gran Varon became perhaps Colon’s greatest hit and a staple of his concerts. In later years he updated the chronology, moving Simon’s dates of birth and death up seven years to 1963 and 1993. Perhaps he did this to emphasize the ongoing nature of this epidemic, but to my mind, the song is indelibly associated with the 1980s, with the terrible panic and despair of those first few years of epidemic, and of the emotional release that this song brought. Something beautiful could come out of this tragedy, some lesson learned, some community created, all in a great song to dance to and to celebrate life!
The song was recorded in 1988 and became part of Colon’s live show, then the album was released in June of 1989 and El Gran Varon quickly became a staple of salsa radio and disco. Part of its success might be the way that this performance elicits an emotional response without being maudlin, prissy or preachy. It is a difficult balancing act, and the many unsuccessful attempts to duplicate the success of Willie Colon with this material attest to that fact. A film was made in Mexico in 2002 based on this song, “Simon, el Gran Varon.” Unfortunately, this film is widely considered unsuccessful and cartoonish. Other artists have done covers of the song El Gran Varon, but nothing equals the original..
The lyrics were written by Omar Alfanno. When you read the words, you get a sense of just how much story has been packed into this one song. It is finely crafted, and quite effective in Spanish, drawing on many familiar sources, from the Mexican proverb about the bent tree to the Bible proverb about casting stones, and even giving elegant form to the lemonade adage attributed to the actress Joan Collins. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to reproduce the smooth prose of these lyrics and remain true to the words at the same time. Here is my English translation, as faithful to the original as the language will allow:
El Gran Varon, The Big Man
In a hospital room, At 9:43, Simon was born. It was the summer of ’56, He was the pride of Don Andrés, Because he was a boy. He was brought up like everyone else, With a tough hand and severity, he never talked back. When you grow up, you’re going to study the same b.s. like your father. Listen good, you have to be a big man.
Simon left the country, and far from home he forgot all about that sermon. He changed his way of walking, he wore a skirt, lipstick and carried a handbag. People say that one day his father went to visit him by surprise. Wow, what a mistake! A woman walked by and spoke to him: Hello, daddy, how are you? Don’t you recognize me? It’s me, Simon! Simon, your son, the big man!
Chorus: You can never correct nature, the tree that is born bent will never straighten its trunk.
But he cared too much what people would say. He never spoke to his son again, and he left him forever.
Don’t complain, Andrés, don’t complain at all. If it’s lemons that fall from the sky then learn how to make lemonade.
Then as the years passed, Andrés thought better, and he became furious that his son never wrote to him. Finally he received news about whatever happened to his son, And Andrés never forgot the day that he received that sad call.
In a hospital room, With a strange disease Simon died. It was the summer of ’86, And at the bedside of patient number ten, Nobody cried.
You have to have pity, and quit the moralizing, Those who are free of sin should cast the first stone. And he who can never forgive, has the most certain fate, Of living with his bitter regrets in his own private hell.
Dr. sipmac supports South Park, even if it upsets him once in a while.
It is said that Colombian showbiz is too bland: not a serious scandal can be found here like in other latitudes (For that we would look into the political section of the newspapers). A little pot, a little coke, some cheating around, a blurry sex tape and that’s all. The lack of really explosive material doesn’t mean the Colombian gossip journalists are somewhat more considerate and caring than their peers around the globe. The paparazzi crowd is still a new thing; relatively speaking (the first time they worked effectively in the 90’s was when they caught Miguel Varoni cheating on his then wife, Patricia Ercole – Aura Cristina Geithner cried on TV), but the gossip columns distilled venom from the very beginning.
So, what to do when a big Colombian celebrity, with worldwide fame does not give an opportunity to embarrass herself? Act in a more wicked way with every single petty detail of her life.
Does she come from that dreadful region full of riffraff and not the capital city? Somehow a type of a hick? Then mock her and imply by that her imagined shortcomings, even if they are stereotypes bordering on hate speech. After all, people there and in the capital city still don’t know what hate speech is. You can call it gossip.
When she left the country did she lose her accent? Tell then she sold out to the Argentineans. Hey, most
of us do not know it, but it is relative easy for natives of that region to lose their particular accent (even if they do not want it) once they travel outside the country for a long time.
Did she build a school for the poor children of her city? Is she an advocate for education? Point out she isn’t cool enough give a free concert in Cuba.
Did she go to Oxford to give a lecture about education? Remain silent about it then!
Is her last CD named Loba/She-Wolf? We hit the jackpot! Loba means a lowbrow woman. She was asking for it. Really.
There’s no way to avoid it. You can’t please everybody, and there are newspapers and magazines to be sold, websites (ahem) to be filled with any kind of mindless drivel and so are the TV channels and radio stations. Otherwise, how would they eat without reporting anything newsworthy?
Sip doesn’t approve or agree with everything Shakira, but he knows when unfair is unfair. Tearing her to shreds makes you maybe make a living, but it does not amuse me. For instance, there are still witnesses that can recall a young Dr. sipmac proclaiming that the girl singing Magia was going to be great. What does suppose to mean? Sip followed her career closely, and thinks this time her newest album is a pretty good one. It was a stroke of genius to bring back unexpectedly the funk/disco into the mainstream with She-Wolf. For this time Loba/She-Wolf means classy.
That said, dear Gossip Journalist, you can go on with your mockery again. Ah, Dr. sipmac does not know Shakira personally, nor he receives any kind of compensation from her.
Christine, wherever you are, please take 'em up!
