"My Beautiful Island" new song premiere by Alexis Valdés, with Haydeé and Pablo Milanés

April 21, 2023

Alexis Valdés premiered this Thursday the song My Beautiful Island, a tribute to Cuba that features the collaboration of Pablo and Haydée Milanés. "This collaboration for 'My Beautiful Island' with Pablo and Haydée Milanés was a miracle, something magical.

When I was singing it in my head I felt that I should write some new verses, and I imagined that Pablo should be there, that the voice, style and greatness of Pablo Milanés, would be the ideal finishing touch for the song," said the singer and humorist on his YouTube channel, where the song can already be heard.

He explained that originally, the song was planned with the exclusive collaboration of Haydée, but when he sent the new verses to Pablo, he liked them very much. The song contains the last phrase that father and daughter sang together: "I miss you, Cuba", according to what Haydée has reported.

"When they sent me his recorded part, I was shocked... it was one of the last projects he was able to complete," Valdés said about Pablo, who passed away on November 22. "I am from a land of sea asleep on the horizon. I am from a piece of blue where mockingbirds sing. I am from sun, cane and coffee I am from sugarcane juice and stars. I am from there, I am from there, From my Beautiful Island," the song says.

The nostalgic melody is accompanied by the voice of Haydée and Pablo Milanés in the verse "My old photos / my foamy sea / My beautiful island / my beautiful island / Your name is ...Cuba". But Pablo takes over the lyrics when he sings: "I am from a colonial balcony, I am from a kiss and a memory, I am from a porch chair, where my dead await me. I am from there I am from there from my beautiful island. My beautiful island my big house my long footprints from so much walking through you My old photos my foamy sea My beautiful island My beautiful island I miss you... Cuba ".

Haydée Milanés recommended the song to her Instagram followers and assured them that the song will "reach the deepest part of your heart". "Alexis invited my father @pablo_milanes_oficial and me to collaborate with him on this song, and what we didn't imagine is that this would be the last time we would unite our voices to sing. Among other reasons, that's why it cuts me so deep.

But the thing is that the song speaks of feelings that touch each Cuban; the love for our island, its colors, the memory of our experiences, our customs, our childhood games. But this song also speaks to the feeling and the most heartbreaking fact of all, that of not being able to return to your land," said the artist. She said that "the day I saw the video with my father @karollwilliam would be the day we said goodbye forever. My throat gets a lump in it when his voice comes in, that voice that sounds like a heart singing to you. I find myself thinking as I listen to 'I miss you, Cuba', the last phrase that we curiously sang; what such a deep, such personal feeling and yet so spread throughout the world...

I didn't think when we recorded this song that its lyrics would take on so much meaning for me," expressed Haydée. Dozens of Cubans who heard the song in the first minutes after the premiere said that the song moved them not only because of the heartfelt image of Cuba that it presents, but because of the reunion with Pablo. "Dear Alexis, this work of art has moved me deeply, beautiful the music and lyrics and especially the beautiful and profound voice of our Pablo Milanés perhaps for the last time, as a Cuban woman I thank you deeply for this tribute to our suffering Cuba, thank you very much," commented one of Valdés' followers.

"I just heard the song My Beautiful Island, written by Alexis Valdés and performed by him, Haydée Milanés and the incomparable and unique Pablo Milanés. There are songs that from the first time you hear them make a lump in your throat, and you have to listen to them over and over again because they are magical and evoke a unique place, a place that I love and to which I belong but that I haven't seen for 43 years and I don't know if I'll see it again, Cuba, my beautiful island.

The feeling with which Alexis, Haydée and Pablo sang it gets into your bones because as their lyrics say I am from there. I didn't write it but I feel it's mine, as all Cubans who hear it will feel it. It feels eternal like a classic and it just was born. Long live good music," emphasized another.

"It is probably the most beautiful song I have written and, with these luxury collaborations, undoubtedly, one of the most special things I have done in music in my entire life," said the versatile artist, who thanked Pablo and Haydée, and their managers and companions for life, for their collaboration and generosity.

Having died in November 2022 at the age of 79, Pablo Milanés will posthumously premiere the album "Love and Salsa, 80th Anniversary", in which he brings his voice back together with great artists who paid tribute to his musical work with salsa arrangements of some of his classic songs and other unreleased ones.