Credit for banner image above: The renowned Cuban American pianist Enrique Chía offered a virtual concert in 2020, entitled An Hour Remembering Our Music from My Living Room. Photo by Begui Records, 2013.
Watch the 2020 virtual concert by Enrique Chía (on YouTube)
View the concert program (PDF)
Since 1994, CRI has sponsored a concert series to celebrate the diverse musical traditions of Cuba and its diaspora, bringing a broad spectrum of the Greater Miami community to FIU. Each concert focuses on a different theme and includes works by Cuban and other composers. CRI has organized concerts devoted to the compositions of Ernesto Lecuona, Music for Martí, Spanish composers on Cuba, The World Sings to Cuba, the trajectory of the Cuban danzón, and Albita's salsa, among other topics.
More than 1,600 persons watched the 2020 virtual Classically Cuban concert with Enrique Chía. The concert was broadcast on YouTube on Sunday, December 6, 2020, from 5:00 to 6:00 PM. More than 6,600 people have viewed the video recording on TouTube as of September, 2024. The cosponsors of the event were the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center, CasaCuba, the FIU School of Music, and the FIU Libraries.
The program featured some of the best-known and most beloved boleros and other staples of Cuba's musical repertoire. The evening opened with a medley of romantic songs by Ernesto Lecuona, including “Siempre en mi corazón” (“Always in My Heart”) and “Noche azul” (“Blue Night”), as well as “Las perlas de tu boca” (“The Pearls of Your Mouth”) by Eliseo Grenet and “¿Y tú qué has hecho?” (“And What Have You Done?”) by Eusebio Delfín. The concert continued with a potpourri of popular pieces such as “Al vaivén de mi carreta” (“To the Swaying of My Oxcart”) by Ñico Saquito; “La última noche que pasé contigo” (“The Last Night I Spent with You”) by Bobby Collazo; and “Lágrimas Negras” (“Black Tears”) by Miguel Matamoros. The program ended on a nostalgic note with the unofficial anthem of Cubans in exile, “Cuando salí de Cuba” (“When I Left Cuba”) by Luis Aguilé.
Born in Cienfuegos, Cuba, Enrique Chía is an accomplished and prolific recording artist whose unique and organic playing style is rooted in the grand prerevolutionary musical traditions of Cuba, as well as in the Great American Songbook and sophisticated pop of his adopted homeland. He has released over forty recordings that have done remarkably well across the Americas, including Mexico and the Caribbean, and have provided the framework for his stirring, always sold-out live performances. His recordings include the 2001 Grammy Award-nominated The Music of Ernesto Lecuona; the bestselling album Sentimental Piano (originally released in 2004); the 2008 Emmy Award-winning La Cuba eterna; and the 2018 album Piano under the Stars at Vizcaya.