The Fourth Case of the Barefoot Latin Dance Party

Over the past few months I have really stepped up my game searching for Cuban records. (I owe much of my recent success to a wonderful book on the subject:  "Cuba and its Music" by Ned Sublette... recommended.) 

This week's playlist is tilted away from Havana, toward the broad swath of eastern Cuba known as "Oriente." This was the original center of power in Cuba, packed with sugar plantations and ports facing Spain, across the Atlantic. Like the deep South in the USA, this area was the heart of Cuba's slave trade; many musical traditions here have direct roots to African musical forms. 

This region produces most of Cuba's 'country' music, as played by guitar-led duos and trios. This region was also fertile ground for the original soneros of the early 20th century; this musical form ("son") was later recorded by groups such as Septeto Nacional and Septeto Habanero. Today's set begins with some Cuban country sounds before moving into a brief sampling of traditional son.

The middle of today's set features some unusual sounds from Cuba that I find delightful, with a heavy sampling of 'folkloric' combo bandleader Alfredo Zayas, and some street performers recorded in Santiago. 

As we near the end of the set we will sample another Cuban musical tradition with roots in African musical forms:  the sounds we know today as "rumba" were originally known as "guaguanco." Like so many musical forms in the US, rumba was considered very much a unique feature of the Afro-Cuban community before whites began recording this music in the mid-twentieth century.