The significance of the Buena Vista Social Club project - Ry Cooder's phenomenally successful rediscovery of classic Cuban folk music - lies in its star Compay Segundo's name. That the erstwhile Francisco Repilado should be nicknamed "Comrade Second" - because he tends to sing second harmony - bespeaks an effortlessly, indelibly musical culture. As the music of the English-speaking world suffocates in its shrink-wrapping, is it any wonder western punters are flocking to reconnect with less commercial, more spontaneous sounds?
Hence the slightly condescending, noble-savage tone of Wim Wenders' documentary of the album, which had Cuba's greatest musicians blinking childlike through the streets of New York. Here were unsullied, innocent musicians - a term which can hardly be applied to that wily old dog Segundo, who was greeted with real affection at the Festival Hall. How strange it must seem to the wizened, wickedly grinning 93-year-old - who, pre-Cooder, had languished in obscurity since the 60s - to be cheered by a capacity crowd of London's glitterati and accosted onstage by young women with flowers. Stranger still for his son, silver-haired himself and playing double bass in dad's band.
Not that Segundo looks, or acts, his age. Dancing onstage in trademark panama hat, he coyly unbuttons his jacket to show off a slinky sashay that would have put Elvis the Pelvis (two decades his junior) to shame. Standing, and shimmying, throughout the gig, he plucked nimbly at his customised guitar - a seven-string armonico he invented in the 20s - and, for percussive effect, repeatedly planted sloppy kisses on its side.
The music - Cuban son, merengue and cha cha cha of the types Segundo pioneered in the 40s - is beautiful, and performed beautifully, Se gundo's deep, gentle voice underscored distinctively by three-part clarinet harmonies. It helped that clarinettist Rafael Inciarte was a showman to rival Segundo himself, urging the crowd to clap, to dance, to sing along. One longed to be with Segundo y Sus Muchachos in a ballroom somewhere, with rum unlimited and room to dance.
And so one almost was by the concert's end, as the audience spilled from its seats, crowding the aisle and the front of the stage in shuffling, swaying delirium. The Cuban flag unfurled to cheers that bode well for Ken Livingstone. Wild whoops greeted the opening chords of Segundo's irresistible signature tune, Chan Chan, and its chant-along "Compay, Compay" refrain. Introduced before the gig as being "in the middle stage of his career", Segundo performed with the panache of a man who senses that his best years may, remarkably, be ahead of him.
