Reply #30: I don't speak a word of Spanish, but when I heard that song I recognized it immediately . . .

[OneBlueSky]

as the first cut on the Buena Vista Social Club album, which I've listened to many times since it came out in 1997 . . . according to the liner notes, the song is called Chan Chan, and it's a typical example of the son style of Cuban music that was written by the then 89-year-old Compay Segundo, who was one of the largely forgotten Cuban musicians who Ry Cooder assembled for the BVSC project . . . Segundo passed away in 2003, and here's a little bit of the Wikipedia entry about him . . .

"Compay Segundo, so called because he was always second voice in his musical partnerships, moved to Santiago de Cuba at age 9. His first engagement was in the Municipal Band of Santiago de Cuba, directed by his teacher, Enrique Bueno. After a spell in a quintet he moved to Havana in 1934, where he also played in the Municipal Band, on the clarinet. He also learnt to play the guitar and the tres: these became his usual instruments. Compay Segundo was also the inventor of the armónico, a seven-stringed guitar-like instrument, created to eliminate a harmonic jump in the Spanish guitar and the tres. In the 1950s he became well-known as the second voice and tres player in Los Compadres, a duo he formed with Lorenzo Hierrezuelo in 1947.

"Los Compadres were one of the most successful Cuban duos of their time. Greater international fame came later, in 1997, with the release of the Buena Vista Social Club album, a hugely successful recording which won several Grammy awards. Compay Segundo appeared in the film of the same title, made subsequently by Wim Wenders.

Segundo's most famous composition is Chan Chan, the opening track on the Buena Vista Social Club album, whose four opening chords are instantly recognizable all over the world. Chan Chan was recorded by Segundo himself various times as well as by countless other Latin artists."