Notes From A Native Daughter

March 6, 2022

S4 Ep135: Hugo Perez, filmmaker, and director OMARA

Hugo Perez’s Documentary OMARA on Afro-Cuban Singer and cultural icon, Omara Portuondo is now playing in the 39th Miami Film Festival. The documentary will be streaming nationwide with in-person Miami screenings from through March 13, 2022.

October 15, 2021

S4 Ep134: Episode 134 | Adriana Bosch, director, Letters to Eloisa

<div>Adriana Bosch is fantastic—humble, open, present, giving, loving, sincere, and elegant. Really. She came in as an equal and a woman artist sharing her journey. </div> <br> <div>Her latest documentary, <a href="https://www.letterstoeloisa.com/">Letters to Eloisa</a>, is a lyrical must-watch profile dedicated to the late and great José Lezama Lima. <br> <br> It airs tonight—October 15— on PBS 10-11 p.m. EST (<a href="http://www.pbs.org/tv_schedules/">check local listings</a>) under the New Season of Latino Public Broadcasting’s VOCES.</div> <br> <div>She wants people to watch this film. You will not regret it. Adriana captures so much in so little time. Towards the end, my tears just flowed. She knew how to place Lezama’s letters to his sister Eloisa to reveal everything she wanted to say. I guess that’s what artistic prowess, agility, and humanity are.</div> <br> <div> Letters to Eloisa is an ode about “an obscured artist.” And yet, the film is about the larger picture—Cuban history, dissenters everywhere, artistic freedom, and the fragility of brave people. She has a lot to say about a man who lived by his word—no small feat.</div> <br> <div>I hope sometime soon, Adriana Bosch gets a retrospective. She has a lot to give and say, and we need her, todos los que somo poetas de corazón.</div> <div>  </div> <div>+</div> <br> <div>2021 for me, has had a Cuban theme, and all I can say is that I’m grateful for it. </div> <br> <div>Earlier this year, I helped Pedrito Martínez with his album Acertijos (Riddles), now nominated for a Latin Grammy in the Best Tropical Album category. Find his production details <a href="https://www.pedritomartinezmusic.com/">here</a> and follow him on IG, because it’s full of good percussion bites, and he’s a master.</div> <br> <div>Then came We Have Iré. You can read and learn about that project <a href="https://www.wehaveire.com/">here</a>—music by Yosvany Terry with special guest Xiomara Laugart, words by Paul S. Flores. Directed by Rosalba Rolón of Pregones/PRTT in New York, <a href="https://www.wehaveire.com/">We Have Iré</a> is a multimedia theater work that portrays real-life stories of Cuban emigré artists real-life stories framed by Flores’s exploration of his roots as a Cuban-American as he traveled back to Cuba with them. Through the medium of music -- always an essential element in the Cuban story – We Have Iré relives their struggles to relocate to the US and explores the new identities they constructed in the process. </div> <br> <div>We Have Iré was commissioned and sponsored by the National Performance Network, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) in San Francisco, Pregones/PRTT in New York City, GALA Theatre in Washington D.C., MACLA/Movimiento de Arte y Cultura Latino Americana in San José, MECA-Houston, Miami </div> <br> <div>That’s all for now/</div> <div>Regreso pronto—Back soon. It's been a ride this pandemic year...LOL<br> <br> Sol</div>

April 18, 2021

S4 Ep133: Episode 133 | Carlos Gutierrez, 20 years of Cinema Tropical