"Buena Vista" performer to appear at UB

By PATRICIA DONOVAN
News Services Editor

Those who loved the spectacular African-Cuban rhythms of the film "Buena Vista Social Club" will thrill to the sounds of one of the film's featured performers, Pio Levya, who, with his band, La Fuerza Brava, will give a short, free public "informance" at noon Oct. 5 in Baird Recital Hall, Room 250 Baird Hall, on the North Campus.

Levya, a diminutive octogenarian virtually unknown to American audiences before his film appearance, has been touring Europe and Africa for years and has a strong following in West Africa, where the Afro-Cuban tradition is rooted.

Although his music is stylistically similar to the music heard in the film, the wildly energetic Levya has a contagious style of his own, performed in a voice that is at once raspy and guttural, sweet and melodic.

One critic likened it to that of Louis Armstrong, noting that Levya gives "a poignant edge to romantic chestnuts like 'Dos Gardenias,' while his energy and vitality make show stoppers like 'La Candela' particularly exciting."

The quintet La Fuerza Brava, headed by adept and versatile trumpeter Nestor Suarez, is augmented by two sultry young singers and has the sound of a 12-piece orchestra. The group is noted for such numbers as "Elubs Chango," whose pulsating, percussive beat so beautifully represents the Afro-Cuban style, and "Habana Del Este," a lush, melodious paean to a part of Cuba's capital city

La Fuerza Brava will perform Oct. 6 in Rockwell Hall on the campus of Buffalo State College.