Liuba María and her singing

The city of Querétaro, capital of the state of the same name in the Mexican Republic, was once again the epicenter of Spanish-language singer-songwriters with the now renewed TrovAbierta Festival and a weekend program that included local and international talents. It was also an unbeatable occasion to get closer to the live work of our Liuba María Hevia, someone who sustains against all odds a solid, coherent, indispensable and yet not always appreciated career of more than three decades.

I still have an indelible impression of the first time I heard it. It was on the television program A Cappellamany, many years ago. I don't remember what she sang, but the next day I commented with her director, Guille Vilar, that she had seemed to me a sort of Judy Collins in Spanish. Perhaps they differed in styles, coloraturas and projections, but the crystalline purity of her timbre gave me a very close emotional sensation. When I later became part of the media, I programmed her on the radio as much as I could and followed her work, sometimes not as closely as I would have liked, but without straying too far. 

The announcement that she would be in Querétaro on Saturday, November 19, as part of the Festival, was the perfect pretext to travel to that city, after almost three years in which pandemic and complications prevented me from walking its streets. Backed by the ubiquitous and indispensable Arnulfo J. Guerra, Liuba was professional, grateful and confident, with the naked seduction of her voice and guitar. Her style continues to be full of passions and references that go through historical and new trova, country tunes and urban habaneras, tango, bolero, and (needless to say!) children's songs.

In the latter category, it has classics that were part of the soundtrack of the childhood of at least a couple of generations of Cubans. The fact that my 10 year old son's eyes lit up that night when he listened to Cinnamon granite stele was the confirmation of this undeniable fact. Liuba is in the best tradition of Teresita Fernández, in a line that Rita del Prado also drinks from: the combination of pieces for children and adults in her repertoire. Next to the contagious Vinagrito, Song of the almost said it and The little train and the ant have placed topics such as There can be no loneliness, Old song for your hands and Si me falta tu sonrisa. As necessary one as the other. They do not establish borders between both productions. The same refined lyric and the same all-encompassing feeling flow through their melodies and verses.   

In barely an hour, and while the sky closed with an unusual threat of rain, Liuba gave around twenty songs. Many of them I knew from albums and concerts; others sounded like a pleasant novelty. With the threads of the Moon, Coffee kisses, My old Havana, My songmemories and dreams under the umbrella of a single sigh. A way of doing, poetically and musically, that summarizes the indelible and beautiful seal of a creator that seems to me tireless and vital. 

For those of us who have consumed Cuban trova in a more or less habitual way, it is often not easy to make the leap to other national modes of trova. I believe that there are substantial differences between the styles of the cultors on the island and those of other countries, apart from the natural transfer of influences that time, the media, contacts of all kinds and the circulation of recordings can bring about. I suppose that the value of each one is linked to the level of commitment, acceptance, knowledge and bond one has with them. Of course, I have found troubadours of different nationalities whose works seem to me interesting, very good, even essential. However, with very few exceptions, somehow I always end up in the shores of our own. Maybe it's just a question of affinities and personal hobbies, but that's the way it is.

After announcing the farewell, and just as his guitar attacked the last chord, it started to rain. It was as if the night had waited until that moment to open the floodgates of the clouds. As if, anxious to listen to it, she —just like us— to delight in Liuba and her singing.