Guy Cuevas
Encyclopedia
Guy Cuevas is a Cuban-born writer, musician, and legendary Paris disc jockey. Born Guillermo Cuevas Carrión, he worked the turntables and the crowds at Club Sept, and Le Palace before becoming the artistic director, first of Les Bains Douches, then the Barrio Latino.
As a DJ he was known for a creative mix featuring the funk and soul of the Philadelphia Sound, along with his close connections to the world of high fashion.
, Cuba in 1945. Showing early promise as a writer, he was awarded a scholarship to a playwriting workshop created shortly after the 1959 revolution.
Held at the National Theater of Cuba
directed by Fermín Borges, other students included Eugenio Hernández, Gerardo Fulleda León, Ana Justina Cabrera, Santiago Ruiz and José Mario Rodríguez, many of whom have made names for themselves as playwrights and authors.
Fulleda León remembers the group hanging out for long hours after class in cafes or street corners to talk about essays, plays, ethnographies, stories and poems, whatever they were working on.
While still attending the workshop, Cuevas published a collection of short stories, "Ni un Sí, ni un No" with Ediciones El Puente
founded by fellow student José Mario Rodríguez.
In 1964, Cuevas immigrated to France where he continued to write, sleeping on floors, and working odd jobs until he got his first job DJing at club Nuage. His big break came shortly afterward, when he was discovered by the openly gay impresario Fabrice Emaer
, who hired him as a DJ at Club Sept, his restaurant-discothèque at 7 (sept) Sainte-Anne street.
Situated in the middle of the gay neighborhood near the Palais-Royal, Le Sept was one of the most exclusive clubs in the city with a restaurant on the ground floor, and a minuscule dance floor in the basement. Club goers hailed the extravagant décor, the mix of beautiful people, fashionistas, artists and intellectuals, homos and heteros, and of course, the music.
One writer has called the Sept, "the epicenter of disco with DJ Guy Cuevas at the turntables.
He played the O'Jays, Billy Paul, Teddy Pendergrass and Marvin Gaye, as well as Salsa and Latin American music, and sometimes, "stuff that wasn't at all danceable, like Marilyn Monroe
or bird sounds or tam tam, whatever passed through my head."
He liked to "break rhythms, surprise, innovated, dare, violate, even your ears." He spent his days listening to records at, Chez Givaudan, identifying and memorizing the best bits. At night he'd put on his new discoveries.
Paquita Paquin, a journalist and former club goer wrote in her recent memoirs : "At the end of the night, he would sometimes agree to put on some of our requests, but if not, would explain about balance, strength, and the rhythm he was looking for in his program that didn't always leave room for our endless hits. Guy Cuevas is a genius.".
"There was always a line at the door, and nobody left the dance floor until daybreak."
Emaer's inspiration for Le Palace was not just the crowd pressing more and more at the door to the Sept to hear Guy Cuevas, but a visit to New York in 1977, in which he discovered Studio 54
. He was impressed and repulsed at the same time. "It is completely sterilized, a ghetto for model agencies and Régine's emirs...." He described the clubgoers as "totally clean, beautiful, they look like they are fed on high quality corn." He became determined to offer a French response, eventually choosing Le Palace, the decrepit theater and architectural gem on rue Faubourg Montmartre.
The theater space, where the balconies were left intact, allowed le Palace more flexibility than Studio 54. The club sometimes held live concerts (Prince
, Bette Midler
, Divine, Tom Waits
...), premiered films or showed clips during the music. Fabulous balls were organized by designers like Kenzo
and Karl Lagerfeld
that rivaled any theater performances. Emaer also continued his policy of mixing an interesting crowd.
However, Cuevas reports that his DJing at the Palace was more conventional than at the Sept, largely because the financial stakes were so high. Prior to the opening, he actually made several trips to New York to study their rival, Studio 54
. "In terms of the general programming of the DJ, I noticed that his choice was systematically efficient and commercial. Above all, he played what the crowd was waiting for, the things that were in fashion at the time, which means Disco
! When le Palace opened in March of 1978... I also successfully played the disco card."
He put on Donna Summer
, the Village People
, and the Bee Gees
, but would also slip in a few unknown pearls, or segments of something totally unexpected, like the helicopter sounds from the original soundtrack from the film Apocalypse Now
, or a little bit of a Vivaldi concerto.
For Cuevas, le Palace was a less fun than the Sept. "It sounded so repetitive to my ears I had to fight against boredom. I wanted to create something, to invent, but I got stuck slapping the same hits on the turntable."
When he couldn't stand it any more, he worked as a host with Paquita Paquin in the exclusive downstairs club, called Le Privilege, before he left the club for good in 1982.
Afterward, Cuevas worked for several years as an artistic director, first of the club Bains Douches on rue du Bourg l'Abbé, then at the Barrio Latio on rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine.
He also worked widely DJing fashion shows, and doing small parts in movies.
He recorded three singles, Ebony Game (1981) with Gaumont Musique, and Obsession (1982), and Gallo Negro (1984) with Island Records which also produced his friend Grace Jones.
Prized by collectors, his single "Obsessions," released only in France, is a funk classic. "Steven Stanley
and the legendary Francois Kevorkian
contributed to the record with their outstanding Nassau mix. The record was first aired on French radio by D'bora and Bobby M, who were artists themselves and disc-jockeys on Canal 89, a local funk station in Paris."
It was re-released in 2008 as part of Funky Nassau - The Compass Point Story 1980-1986 on Strut Records.
Cuevas was also attracted by fashion. A recent auction of Cuevas' vintage wardrobe at AuctionArt included clothes by Yves Saint Laurent
, Monana, Kenzo, Hermes
, Gucci
, Louis Vuitton
, Pierre Cardin
, Dior
most of which were given to Cuevas by the designers themselves.
In the '90's, he had his own fashion line and boutique in St. Germain, encouraged by many of the designers that were his personal friends.
As a DJ he was known for a creative mix featuring the funk and soul of the Philadelphia Sound, along with his close connections to the world of high fashion.
Cuban Origins
Guy Cuevas, (Guillermo Cuevas Carrión) was born in HavanaHavana
Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...
, Cuba in 1945. Showing early promise as a writer, he was awarded a scholarship to a playwriting workshop created shortly after the 1959 revolution.
Held at the National Theater of Cuba
National Theater of Cuba
The National Theater of Cuba is a theater in Havana, Cuba, establish September 3, 1979, with a function of gala for the delegations assistants to the VI Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement celebrated in Havana in that year...
directed by Fermín Borges, other students included Eugenio Hernández, Gerardo Fulleda León, Ana Justina Cabrera, Santiago Ruiz and José Mario Rodríguez, many of whom have made names for themselves as playwrights and authors.
Fulleda León remembers the group hanging out for long hours after class in cafes or street corners to talk about essays, plays, ethnographies, stories and poems, whatever they were working on.
While still attending the workshop, Cuevas published a collection of short stories, "Ni un Sí, ni un No" with Ediciones El Puente
Ediciones El Puente
Ediciones El Puente was a literary project for young writers in Cuba just after the 1959 revolution. Between 1961–1965 they published each other's work, introduced dozens of new voices, and held readings and performances....
founded by fellow student José Mario Rodríguez.
In 1964, Cuevas immigrated to France where he continued to write, sleeping on floors, and working odd jobs until he got his first job DJing at club Nuage. His big break came shortly afterward, when he was discovered by the openly gay impresario Fabrice Emaer
Fabrice Emaer
Fabrice Emaer called "The Prince of the night" was an impresario whose nightclubs le Sept, and le Palace, were the premier spots in Paris nightlife in the 1970s and early 1980s, celebrated in memoirs and songs like Amanda Lear's 1979 song "Fashion Pack" which declared, "In Paris you got to be seen...
, who hired him as a DJ at Club Sept, his restaurant-discothèque at 7 (sept) Sainte-Anne street.
Le Sept
In Paris you got to be seen at Maxim's
The Palace
The 7 and then go Chez Regine
Champagne
Caviar
Haute-couture
Expensive cars
Saint Laurent and Loulou
Rich ladies with a few bijoux.
—Amanda LearAmanda LearAmanda Lear is a French singer, lyricist, composer, painter, TV presenter, actress and novelist....
, Fashion Pack, 1979
Situated in the middle of the gay neighborhood near the Palais-Royal, Le Sept was one of the most exclusive clubs in the city with a restaurant on the ground floor, and a minuscule dance floor in the basement. Club goers hailed the extravagant décor, the mix of beautiful people, fashionistas, artists and intellectuals, homos and heteros, and of course, the music.
One writer has called the Sept, "the epicenter of disco with DJ Guy Cuevas at the turntables.
He played the O'Jays, Billy Paul, Teddy Pendergrass and Marvin Gaye, as well as Salsa and Latin American music, and sometimes, "stuff that wasn't at all danceable, like Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, singer, model and showgirl who became a major sex symbol, starring in a number of commercially successful motion pictures during the 1950s....
or bird sounds or tam tam, whatever passed through my head."
He liked to "break rhythms, surprise, innovated, dare, violate, even your ears." He spent his days listening to records at, Chez Givaudan, identifying and memorizing the best bits. At night he'd put on his new discoveries.
Paquita Paquin, a journalist and former club goer wrote in her recent memoirs : "At the end of the night, he would sometimes agree to put on some of our requests, but if not, would explain about balance, strength, and the rhythm he was looking for in his program that didn't always leave room for our endless hits. Guy Cuevas is a genius.".
"There was always a line at the door, and nobody left the dance floor until daybreak."
The Palace
Le Club Sept was only a rehearsal for what was to come. From the opening night, Le Palace reflected the arrival of disco with Grace JonesGrace JonesGrace Jones is a Jamaican-American singer, model and actress.Jones secured a record deal with Island Records in 1977, which resulted in a string of dance-club hits. In the late 1970s, she adapted the emerging electronic music style and adopted a severe, androgynous look with square-cut hair and...
surrounded by dry ice and shining roses, singing La Vie en RoseLa vie en rose"La Vie en Rose" was the signature song of French singer Édith Piaf.-Signature song of Édith Piaf:Édith Piaf first popularized La Vie en Rose in 1946. The lyrics were written by Piaf and the melody of the song by "Louiguy" . Initially, Piaf's peers and her songwriting team did not think the song...
atop a pink Harley Davidson. It was the temple of a new style of music that caught the world by surprise ... Guy Cuevas had followed Emaer to the Palace, and there his selection was the same: flamboyant. For the first time people danced all the time, not leaving the dance floor except for a quick trip to the toilets or the bar. The music was so sensational that it gave the impression that the Palace was a trampoline in the middle of the Atlantic : Let's All Sing by the Michael Zaeger Band was a hit in France at the same time as the U.S. Suddenly dancing became a lifestyle.
Emaer's inspiration for Le Palace was not just the crowd pressing more and more at the door to the Sept to hear Guy Cuevas, but a visit to New York in 1977, in which he discovered Studio 54
Studio 54
Studio 54 was a highly popular discotheque from 1977 until 1991, located at 254 West 54th Street in Manhattan, New York, USA. It was originally the Gallo Opera House, opening in 1927, after which it changed names several times, eventually becoming a CBS radio and television studio. In 1977 it...
. He was impressed and repulsed at the same time. "It is completely sterilized, a ghetto for model agencies and Régine's emirs...." He described the clubgoers as "totally clean, beautiful, they look like they are fed on high quality corn." He became determined to offer a French response, eventually choosing Le Palace, the decrepit theater and architectural gem on rue Faubourg Montmartre.
The theater space, where the balconies were left intact, allowed le Palace more flexibility than Studio 54. The club sometimes held live concerts (Prince
Prince
Prince is a general term for a ruler, monarch or member of a monarch's or former monarch's family, and is a hereditary title in the nobility of some European states. The feminine equivalent is a princess...
, Bette Midler
Bette Midler
Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...
, Divine, Tom Waits
Tom Waits
Thomas Alan "Tom" Waits is an American singer-songwriter, composer, and actor. Waits has a distinctive voice, described by critic Daniel Durchholz as sounding "like it was soaked in a vat of bourbon, left hanging in the smokehouse for a few months, and then taken outside and run over with a car."...
...), premiered films or showed clips during the music. Fabulous balls were organized by designers like Kenzo
Kenzo Takada
Kenzo Takada is a Japanese fashion designer. He is also the founder of Kenzo, a worldwide brand of perfumes, skincare products and clothes....
and Karl Lagerfeld
Karl Lagerfeld
Karl Lagerfeld is a German fashion designer, artist and photographer based in Paris. He has collaborated on a variety of fashion and art related projects, most notably as head designer and creative director for the fashion house Chanel...
that rivaled any theater performances. Emaer also continued his policy of mixing an interesting crowd.
However, Cuevas reports that his DJing at the Palace was more conventional than at the Sept, largely because the financial stakes were so high. Prior to the opening, he actually made several trips to New York to study their rival, Studio 54
Studio 54
Studio 54 was a highly popular discotheque from 1977 until 1991, located at 254 West 54th Street in Manhattan, New York, USA. It was originally the Gallo Opera House, opening in 1927, after which it changed names several times, eventually becoming a CBS radio and television studio. In 1977 it...
. "In terms of the general programming of the DJ, I noticed that his choice was systematically efficient and commercial. Above all, he played what the crowd was waiting for, the things that were in fashion at the time, which means Disco
Disco
Disco is a genre of dance music. Disco acts charted high during the mid-1970s, and the genre's popularity peaked during the late 1970s. It had its roots in clubs that catered to African American, gay, psychedelic, and other communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and...
! When le Palace opened in March of 1978... I also successfully played the disco card."
He put on Donna Summer
Donna Summer
LaDonna Adrian Gaines , known by her stage name, Donna Summer, is an American singer/songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She has a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Summer is a five-time Grammy winner and was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach...
, the Village People
Village People
Village People is a concept disco group that formed in the United States in 1977, well known for their on-stage costumes depicting American cultural stereotypes, as well as their catchy tunes and suggestive lyrics....
, and the Bee Gees
Bee Gees
The Bee Gees are a musical group that originally comprised three brothers: Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb. The trio was successful for most of their 40-plus years of recording music, but they had two distinct periods of exceptional success: as a pop act in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and as a...
, but would also slip in a few unknown pearls, or segments of something totally unexpected, like the helicopter sounds from the original soundtrack from the film Apocalypse Now
Apocalypse Now
Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American war film set during the Vietnam War, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The central character is US Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard , of MACV-SOG, an assassin sent to kill the renegade and presumed insane Special Forces...
, or a little bit of a Vivaldi concerto.
For Cuevas, le Palace was a less fun than the Sept. "It sounded so repetitive to my ears I had to fight against boredom. I wanted to create something, to invent, but I got stuck slapping the same hits on the turntable."
When he couldn't stand it any more, he worked as a host with Paquita Paquin in the exclusive downstairs club, called Le Privilege, before he left the club for good in 1982.
Afterward, Cuevas worked for several years as an artistic director, first of the club Bains Douches on rue du Bourg l'Abbé, then at the Barrio Latio on rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine.
He also worked widely DJing fashion shows, and doing small parts in movies.
Career: Music and Fashion
Surrounded by music and fashionistas, it's not surprising that Cuevas stepped out of his booth and tried his hand at both.He recorded three singles, Ebony Game (1981) with Gaumont Musique, and Obsession (1982), and Gallo Negro (1984) with Island Records which also produced his friend Grace Jones.
Prized by collectors, his single "Obsessions," released only in France, is a funk classic. "Steven Stanley
Steven Stanley
Steven J. C. Stanley , is a Jamaican audio engineer, record producer and keyboardist who has worked in the reggae, dub and rock music genres since 1975, most notably with Talking Heads, Tom Tom Club and Black Uhuru....
and the legendary Francois Kevorkian
François Kevorkian
François Kevorkian, alias François K, is a French DJ of Armenian origin, remixer, producer and record label owner. Having started his career in renowned clubs such as the Paradise Garage and Studio 54, the New York City resident is widely considered as one of the forefathers of house...
contributed to the record with their outstanding Nassau mix. The record was first aired on French radio by D'bora and Bobby M, who were artists themselves and disc-jockeys on Canal 89, a local funk station in Paris."
It was re-released in 2008 as part of Funky Nassau - The Compass Point Story 1980-1986 on Strut Records.
Cuevas was also attracted by fashion. A recent auction of Cuevas' vintage wardrobe at AuctionArt included clothes by Yves Saint Laurent
Yves Saint Laurent (brand)
Yves Saint Laurent or YSL is a luxury fashion house founded by Yves Saint Laurent and his partner, Pierre Bergé. Today, its chief designer is Stefano Pilati. Yves Saint Laurent, founder of the brand, died in 2008.-History:...
, Monana, Kenzo, Hermes
Hermes
Hermes is the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology and a guide to the Underworld. Hermes was born on Mount Kyllini in Arcadia. An Olympian god, he is also the patron of boundaries and of the travelers who cross them, of shepherds and cowherds, of the cunning of thieves, of orators and...
, Gucci
Gucci
The House of Gucci, better known simply as Gucci , is an Italian fashion and leather goods label, part of the Gucci Group, which is owned by French company PPR...
, Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton Malletier – commonly referred to as Louis Vuitton , or shortened to LV – is a French fashion house founded in 1854 by Louis Vuitton. The label is well known for its LV monogram, which is featured on most products, ranging from luxury trunks and leather goods to ready-to-wear, shoes,...
, Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin
Pierre Cardin Cardin was known for his avant-garde style and his Space Age designs. He prefers geometric shapes and motifs, often ignoring the female form. He advanced into unisex fashions, sometimes experimental, and not always practical...
, Dior
Dior
Dior can mean:* Christian Dior SA, a French clothing retailer* In J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional Middle-earth legendarium:**Dior Eluchíl, a Half-elven of the First Age**Dior , a Steward of GondorDior is a surname, and may refer to:...
most of which were given to Cuevas by the designers themselves.
In the '90's, he had his own fashion line and boutique in St. Germain, encouraged by many of the designers that were his personal friends.
Filmography
- Target of Suspicion (1994) (TV)
- Cómo ser infeliz y disfrutarlo (1994)
- Nefertiti, figlia del sole (1994)
- L'enfant lion (1993)
- Ne réveillez pas un flic qui dort (1988)
- Les frères Pétard (1986)
- Under the Cherry Moon (1986)
- The Jewel of the NileThe Jewel of the NileThe Jewel of the Nile is a 1985 romantic adventure film, and a sequel to the 1984 film Romancing the Stone, with Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito reprising their roles...
(1985) - Un été d'enfer (1984)
Releases
- Ebony Game (7") Gaumont Musique 1981
- Obsession (12") Island Records 1982
- Gallo Negro (12") Island Records 1984
Tracks Appear On
- Funky Nassau - The Compass Point Story 1980-1986 (CD)
- Obsession (Nassau Mix) Strut 2008