But Miami has been the one metropolis the place the group has by no means been capable of carry out with out eliciting controversy. As New Times‘ editorial archive amply attests, the big and politically highly effective el exilio inhabitants within the space sees the group as a illustration and extension of the Castro regime and infrequently pressures venues and live performance promoters to cancel any and all performances by Los Van Van, whose identify interprets from the Spanish as, primarily, the Go-Gos.
Would 2023 be any totally different?
Nah.
Los Van Van had been scheduled to carry out tonight, May 19, on the Miami Beach Bandshell. But Miami Beach Commissioner Alex Fernandez, who’s Cuban-American, crowed this morning on social media that the live performance was off after a dialog with the principals of the Rhythm Foundation, the group that operates the favored out of doors venue.
“For a long time ‘Los Van Van,’ have used their musical expertise to advertise the Cuban tyranny and its violation of primary human rights. Sadly their ticket gross sales would redirect {dollars} out of our financial system to assist maintain the violation of human rights and particular person liberties within Cuba. On behalf of the various victims of the repressive Cuban regime, I’m grateful to the @Rhythm_Foundatn for taking my name, listening with empathy, and canceling this offensive live performance from occurring on the Miami Beach Bandshell,” Fernandez tweeted.
For a long time “Los Van Van,” have used their musical expertise to advertise the Cuban tyranny and its violation of primary human rights
Sadly their ticket gross sales would redirect {dollars} out of our financial system to assist maintain the violation of human rights and particular person liberties within… pic.twitter.com/DBHtwnwINn
— Commissioner Alex Fernandez (@alexjfernandez) May 19, 2023
Reached for remark, Rhythm Foundation program director Laura Quinlan, differed with Fernandez’s model of occasions.
“The present was not produced by the Rhythm Foundation,” Quinlan clarified. “We simply handle the venue. We should not have something to say.”
New Times adopted up, asking Quinlan why Fernandez attributed the cancellation to her group requesting the identify of the promoter behind the occasion. Quinlan didn’t reply.
Adding to the confusion, Los Van Van launched an announcement on Instagram claiming the present was canceled due to journey logistics, asking would-be concertgoers to hunt refunds by the venue.
The Rhythm Foundation would have been a logical backer, given its mission of utilizing music to bridge cultural divides. “We create shared cultural experiences that construct and strengthen the various communities of South Florida by the presentation of reside music. We consider: International cultural trade injects empathy and positivity into the worldwide dialog,” the group’s mission assertion reads partially.
Fernandez’s success in 86ing tonight’s bandshell present harks again to 1999, when Los Van Van carried out its first-ever native present, on the Miami Arena, 30 years after the band’s founding by bassist and arranger Juan Formell, who died in 2014.
Protesters harassed and threw objects at attendees as they entered the venue. Instead of defending concertgoers, Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas requested the U.S. State Department to revoke the band members’ visas and power the cancellation of a return engagement, blaming the band for the “disturbances.”
A couple of weeks years prior, then-New Times workers author Judy Cantor waded into the brouhaha that led as much as the world present in “Hurricane Van Van,” a longform function that started thus:
“Miami Mayor Joe Carollo must brush up on primary civics, to not point out civility. Appearing not too long ago as a visitor on Radio Mambí’s (WAQI-AM 710) weeknight call-in present, Mesa Redonda, Carollo egged on host Armando Perez-Roura and callers as they hurled insults on the Cuban dance band Los Van Van. ‘Dogs,’ ‘bastards,’ ‘rubbish,’ ‘murderers,’ and ‘torturers’ had been all phrases used to explain the well-known group.”
[Editor’s note: Yes, that Joe Carollo.]
In an opinion column printed in that very same September 23, 1999, situation, arts editor Brett Sokol chimed in:
“If you relied on the Herald‘s whitewashed protection of this affair, you solely obtained half the story. That paper’s dry accounts bent over backward to painting aggrieved exile leaders as rational, and understandably upset by the arrival of certainly one of Cuba’s hottest bands, an occasion that was one way or the other ‘culturally inappropriate’ to their delicate sensibilities.”
Following the present, New Times readers had been handled to a recap of the present that finally went on:
The scene outdoors the Miami Arena checked out first like some sick Cuban Miami awards ceremony. As attendees approached, protected by police escorts, the gang behind barricades known as out insults as a substitute of adoration. Newspaper reporters and evening-news crews mutated into one paparazzi horde, speeding ticket holders, demanding to know why that they had come to see Los Van Van. Most gave a easy reply: Because they wished to.
You can see for your self within the clip beneath.
Two years earlier, Cantor had launched non-Cuban Miamians to the band within the presciently titled “Maybe Next Time in Miami.” Wrote Cantor of Van Van’s U.S. sojourn that 12 months — which, not surprisingly, skipped Miami:
“Like visits by different Cuban artists — who, over the previous few years, have more and more bypassed Miami — Los Van Van’s journey was a cultural trade; owing to the U.S. commerce embargo they aren’t permitted to revenue from their tour. Band supervisor Americo Miranda Ortiz says the income from the live shows lined bills plus a $50 per diem for every band member, and the remainder of the proceeds went to music-school scholarship funds and different causes. In addition to performances, the tour included workshops at cultural facilities and schools.”
More than a decade handed between Los Van Van’s first and second Miami appearances. New Times freelance contributor Christopher Lopez previewed that present:
“[A]nyone who has witnessed Los Van Van’s dominance of the stage — be it on video or in individual — can attest to its uncooked power and expertise. Fans of the group, and of Cuban music on the whole, may have an opportunity to witness the spectacle this Sunday. Let’s hope they’ll attend with out having to dodge rocks and trash.”
And Erik Maza, the paper’s editorial fellow on the time, adopted up with a dispatch written aboard a busful of Cuban-Americans who protested the efficiency:
“Los Van Van landed in Miami like a lit match on an historical anthill.
“On Sunday, a whole lot of grizzled Cubans got here out of the woodwork — Westchester, Little Havana, Hialeah — to protest the favored band’s live performance on the James L. Knight Center.
“They got here bearing all of the ardor of Tea Party organizers and stayed effectively into the evening, regardless of a persistent drizzle. A City of Miami cop estimated there have been practically 400 of them.
“The protests started three hours earlier in entrance of Versailles restaurant on Calle Ocho. I had learn that organizers would bus old-timers and blue-haired women from there to downtown.”
Los Van Van did handle to carry out in South Florida final 12 months, taking the stage on the Charles F. Dodge City Center in Pembroke Pines. That live performance was met with protests from some Cuban-Americans who stood outdoors the venue in the course of the present. The band additionally carried out a sold-out present at Studio 60 in Miami in 2019.
Additional reporting by Tom Finkel.