FLAGSTAFF — Katia Cardenal, formerly lead vocalist of the world-renowned Nicaraguan New Song group, Guardabarranco, will perform a free concert at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 24 at Northern Arizona University, Ashurst Auditorium, Flagstaff, concert organizers reported in a media release.
Cardenal, considered by many to be the most important and prolific Nicaraguan female singer today, has recorded 22 albums, 10 solo, and 12 as a member of Guardabarranco. Her 1999 Gold record, “Navegas por las costas” (Sail along the Coast) has sold over 100,000 copies in Norway.
A bilingual singer, Katia recorded with Jackson Browne on his album Looking East (1996), and with the great Cuban singer/ songwriter Silvio Rodríguez on her 2003 album, Sueño de una noche verano (I’m Dreaming of a Summer Night). She also recorded a Pete Seeger song, never recorded by Seeger himself, on a tribute album to him entitled, If I Had a Song (2001). Her rendition of Salvador Cardenal’s song, “Dame Tu Corazón” (Give Me Your Heart) won her a prestigious OTI award on Telemundo’s International Music Festival.
Cardenal has performed around the world in Costa Rica, Cuba, Panama, El Salvador, Canada, Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, Austria, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Faroe Islands, Russia, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Holland, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Chile, Ecuador, Puerto Rico, and the United States. In the 1990s, Guardabarranco toured twenty states and appeared fifty times in this country, twice on National Public Radio (“Mountain Stage” and “Latino USA”).
In 2012, Katia Cardenal donated the Guardabarranco song, “Canción pequeña” (Little Song) for use on the Flagstaff-produced CD, Border Songs, an album that has raised nearly $40,000 for No More Deaths / No más muertes, a volunteer organization that provides humanitarian aid to migrants in the Arizona desert. This little song, like much of Cardenal’s work, calls for the transcendence of nature and humanity over political conflict: “Hace falta borrar las fronteras/ La primavera no lleva documentos para pasar la aduana, (We need to erase the borders / Spring does not carry documents to go through customs)” sings Katia Cardenal, in this chillingly beautiful song. The song ends by calling for us to transcend national divisions and come together in one world: “All the flags should be woven together with so much cloth that they make one great sail for just one world.”
Cardenal has shared the stage with Jackson Browne, Melissa Etheridge, Mercedes Sosa, Nancy Griffith, Bruce Cockburn, Pablo Milanés, Miriam Makeba, Inti-Illimani, Daniel Viglietti, Holly Near, John McCutheon, Pete Seeger and many more.
Her brother and musical partner from Dúo Guardabarranco, Salvador Cardenal, passed away in 2010. She is currently touring with her daughter, Nina Cardenal, who will accompany her on guitar. This will be the first time Katia Cardenal has performed in Flagstaff in nearly 20 years, when she performed with her brother as Guardabarranco at the Coconino Center for the Arts.
This concert is sponsored by Latin American Studies with the Center for Indigenous Music and Culture, Center for International Education, Enrollment Management and Student Affairs, NAU School of Music, NAU Honors College and the Dept. of Global Languages and Cultures.
In addition to this concert, Katia Cardenal will be featured performer at a Border Songs benefit concert (all proceeds go to No More Deaths), at 7 p.m. Friday Oct. 25 at the Coconino Center for the Arts.
For more information, contact Robert Neustadt at bordersongscd@gmail.com