January 19, 2020

Leading and Following: First Impressions to Rapport How to Tango Across the Border of Cuba and America

January 19, 2020/

By James Martin

After dark, the streets filled with music. Drums, horns, singing, and strumming. As you walked along, there wasn’t a street that didn’t have the music of two or three bands saturating the night air. I was starting to relax. Time was an ocean, the oily air was sensual, and music was everywhere.

January 10, 2020

Hatuey: A Memory of Fire: Translating an Opera across Time, Space, Culture and Language

January 10, 2020/

By Deborah Kapchan, in collaboration with Frank London

When I landed in the Havana airport on January 4th 2017, the air embraced me like a warm sea, the boundaries of my skin loosening in the heat. The airport was teeming with taxi drivers holding signs as well as tourists looking for their ride. I searched for my name to no avail. My driver had not come. So I tried to get Cuban money from a Citibank ATM – in case I needed to get my own taxi – until I noticed the words “for deposit only” above the machine. At that point I went outside to wait, breathing in the tobacco smoke that filled the humid air.

Inspiración del Rítmo

By James Martin

By Deborah Kapchan, in collaboration with Frank London