Siete Rayos stands in for Elito Reve - Fairmont Hamilton Princess.

When the Bermuda Music Festival got started on Wednesday evening at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess, it was not with the world famous Cuban group Elito Reve y su Charangon. A Miami-based group of Cuban, Antillian and American musicians, Siete Rayos, filled the bill.

This was a great disappointment to numbers of Bermudians and also Americans who had travelled from as far away California and New Mexico for a chance to hear the renowned Elito Reve y su Charangon. Siete Rayos had to work hard and wait long for any sign that the audience was responsive to their brand of music.

This was a blend of traditional Cuban popular music with North American urban styles, such as Reggae, Rap and Hip Hop. The group consisted of a bassist, guitarist, percussionist, drummer, a female vocalist, and two horns, neither of which was Cuban.

But the audience, spread over the gardens of the Fairmont, and serviced by an ample bar, did eventually warm up, and several members of the audience began dancing. By then Siete Rayos had tried Cumbia mixed with Reggae, spiced with bilingual rap lyrics, a long rambling song "I Ride The Train", rhythmically simple with even simpler lyrics.

Then came a lovely "Cha-cha-cha", dedicated to the beautiful women of Cuba, which began teasingly with a flute solo that promised to take off, but didn't, but it was this number that got the crowd - generously sprinkled with Hispanics - to begin to move.

After this the band seemed to settle. They performed a piece full of references to Chango and Yemaya, Afro Cuban deities, accompanied by their own dancing. The crowd was moving too, if only gently. This brought the warmest applause.

A group of Salsa enthusiasts was by this time on the dock dancing in front of the barge that served as stage.

The group seemed under-rehearsed. The percussionist had to keep time on the cow-bell for the errant drummer who went out of time with each roll, during his solo, or so it seemed. I counted only six songs, all very long, one of which was repeated.

A BET executive came on stage to do 'damage control'. "Am I gonna get beat up in the Press tomorrow?" he wanted to know. He was referring to the non-appearance of the celebrated Elito Reve. There was no attempt to defraud anyone, he said, then promptly blamed the US and its blockade of Cuba, saying that the US Government had confiscated the tickets of Elito's group.

Called back for an encore, Siete Rayos delivered a piece filled with crude and vulgar references to the very group whose absence made their appearance possible, thinking perhaps as it was in Spanish no one would be offended.

They were wrong. But they may have felt themselves wronged by the uncharitable comparison to Elito Reve's group that the BET executive had made in passing.

The night began with Bermuda's Cindy Laws singing on a cold stage without a live musician in sight, "Saving All My Loving", to a recorded track.

She deserved better.

So did the people who came all the way from California to hear Elito Reve and his famous orchestra.