Sometimes the deeptitude of a song comes from overcoming the hardships that gave rise to the sound of sorrow issuing from our mouths. Or, coming forth, at the very least, from the stinging betrayals that tore at our hearts even as we professed the profound appreciation of nevertheless being able to overcome all the terrible disappointments endemic to being here, being brought here, somehow surviving here. And, then, incredibly, partially, or more tragically, fully forgetting from whence we came, plus unsure about where we be going, but nonetheless aware that no matter all the negativities flooding one’s little time on this earth, despite all the downs one wishes were ups, despite the mounds of bitterness we are forced to consume, despite it all, there have been droplets of honey teasing our tongues, no matter how brief, no matter how small, in spite of it all, and, yes, maybe because of it all, there is still a song we can sing, a song that proclaims, despite whatever, whether frolicking in sunshine, or seeking shelter in shit-storm, no matter whatever, WE ARE!

Buika, neé Maria Concepción Balboa Buika (born 11 May 1972), aka Concha Buika, bka simply “Buika” is what Coltrane would sound like if he were woman and sung in Spanish. Yes, yes that is a tall order but who else sings the deep song the way this woman does, what them flamenco people call “duende”? She is a spirit sound inhabiting the heart home hurt of all of us, of each of us, the sufferers. Joyful one day, mournful the next. . . sometimes both on the same day, sometimes neither on any day.

True love is the most awful/awe-filled of all states of being precisely because love embraces all, tightly hugs both the quotidian beauty as well as gingerly touches the ugly wretchedness of daily existence. Or as one beloved lover said to the other: “loving all of me means putting up with a lot of shit.” And that’s so true, we all do; if we eat, we. . ., and if we love, we put up with. . .

Sometimes there are no words; Buika sings the wordless music with the same passion she performs the ecstatic love poems, and, yes, the same passion she emotes the dirge-dirty threnodies. After all, we all, sometimes laugh, sometimes cry. If we are lucky we experience love, if we are human we will definitely be touched by death. Buika be singing all that with every fiber of her being vibrating in her breath.

I literally do not know the words she is saying but I am sure that the song of life is pouring forth from her larynx. After an introduction like this, I usually simply say: enjoy, but in the case of Buika perhaps it is better to paraphrase the Mari Evans poem about Black women, which says “look on me and be renewed”. In Buika’s case, this Black woman sings: “Listen to me, and be fulfilled!”