*** Welcome to piglix ***

They Dance Alone

"They Dance Alone (Cueca Solo)"
Sting-They-Dance-Alone-Cover.jpg
Single by Sting
from the album ...Nothing Like the Sun
A-side "They Dance Alone (Cueca Solo)"
B-side "Ellas Danzan Solas"
Released 1988
Format
Recorded 1987
Genre
Length 7:16
Label A&M
Writer(s) Gordon Sumner
Producer(s) Gordon Sumner
Sting singles chronology
"Fragile"
(1988)
"They Dance Alone"
(1988)
"All This Time"
(1991)

"They Dance Alone (Cueca Solo)" is a protest song composed by English musician Sting and published first on his 1987 album ...Nothing Like the Sun; the song was the fifth and final single released from the album. The song is a metaphor referring to mourning Chilean women (arpilleristas) who dance the Cueca, the national dance of Chile, alone with photographs of their disappeared loved ones in their hands.

Sting was accompanied by Eric Clapton, Fareed Haque and Mark Knopfler on guitar with Rubén Blades providing additional Spanish vocals.

Sting explained his song as a symbolic gesture of protest against the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet whose regime killed thousands of people between 1973 and 1990. This song was recorded in both English (with some spoken Spanish words by the Panamanian salsa singer, Ruben Blades) and Spanish (with additional lyrics by Roberto Livi). This latter version was titled "Ellas Danzan Solas" and was released on the 1988 EP Nada como el sol.

There are several live versions of this song, most notable from the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute (1988), from an Amnesty International concert (1988) in Buenos Aires with Peter Gabriel and the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo and from the Desde Chile... un abrazo a la esperanza concert held at Estadio Nacional in Santiago de Chile (with artists including Jackson Browne, Branford Marsalis, Luz Casal, Sinéad O'Connor, Peter Gabriel, Vinnie Colaiuta and New Kids on the Block) on 13 October 1990 where more than 20 Chilean women came on to the stage with photos of their lost husbands and sons in their hands or pinned to their clothing.


...
Wikipedia

...