Art and Identity
Rock in Cuba : An Eternal Outlaw
Marcia Cairo Havana , Cuba
Rock band The Old School in the concert tribute to The Rolling Stones
D
ozens of articles , documentaries and anecdotes are not enough to recognize that rock music became an outlawed genre after the triumph of the revolution . The cultural policy implemented by the most bitter foe of rock and roll , Fidel Castro , tried to isolate it by all means . In a 1963- speech , Castro already spoke about adolescents with " Elvis-Presleyan " attitudes , long hair and jeans , associated to juvenile delinquency and ideological diversion . There was no discernment . Rockers , vagrants and criminals , homosexuals and the lumpen were the same kettle of fish : the dregs of humanity destroying the revolutionary process . From that moment on , rock was a social danger . The English-language music must be listened in secret . The young people kept Beatles records camouflaged under Cuban music covers , because sometimes the police
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