Idania Valdes and Michel Herrera: Music against Violence

Idania Valdes and Michel Herrera: Music against Violence
Fecha de publicación: 
20 August 2017
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Good music helps to bring joy to the spirit, unite people, and stimulate positive vibes. A group of Cuban artists believe so and they have joined the campaign against genre violence.

Singer Idania Valdes is one of those convinced of the importance of joining a project that is promoted by several Cuban institutions and organizations: “Fortunately, we live in a country whose violence rate is generally low. And I am referring not only to genre violence, but violence as a whole. It does exist. I believe that we, the artists who are sensitive to this campaign, the best way we have to contribute to this project is through the positive messages we may convey in our songs. A message conveying collaboration, reciprocity among human beings, and the fact that people may understand general human rights”.

Young saxophonist Michel Herrera also signed for the campaign Por una vida sin violencia, sumate: “I think violence within human beings is something negative for personal relations, or the society as such. The way I see it is that people using violence cannot communicate. People should live in harmony, and I try to express such energy in my music. The message of my songs is peace and unity. Violence is different from everything I convey in my music. Violence does not connect with people. There is no rational understanding with violence”.

Music for harmony from “The Secret Office”

Both artists and I coincide that it is not about genres, rhythms, or sonorities. You can make people think or dance without altering harmony and respect as violence and discrimination will never be joy. In this regard, Idania says:

“Unfortunately, there is nowadays a high degree of music that goes against everything we are fighting. I am talking about songs whose lyrics discriminate women and human beings. In my opinion, cultural institutions must firstly forbid people may have access to this sort of music. And we, as artists, must play our role. We must try to convince and help other to convince them.”

“I have no problems with any musical genre. Music may be done beautifully from any genre. You can write a song with a nice lyric. There is no need to be aggressive in the way you do things no matter if the song is reggaeton or salsa. And young people follow much these rhythms. In fact, there are lots of artists who have gained international fame, but some of them rather choose easy music in search of popularity”.

We also agree on this subject. Talent may be expressed from any genre and modernity does not mean aggressiveness. In this sense, Michel commented:

“I really think reggaeton’s artists are trying hard to become artists from this specific time, but not necessarily to leave an indelible memory in time. You do not have to portray four-letter words, violence to describe your time. You may be modern and portray the historical time of your country in a very intelligent, sharp, and original way. You can even change some people’s mindset as music is a sort of peaceful therapy”.

Translated by Sergio A. Paneque Diaz // CubaSi Translation Staff

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