Caribbean beats and sings in the island of the Son

''In the Caribbean before the verb was the tambour, the rhythm and the movement''
(Angel Quintero Rivera)

The Caribbean, more than a geographical zone, has been shaped as a concept created by an identity in which music plays, undoubtely, a role of integration. Its peoples have common roots and similar histories in a way that many people consider the term tropical music includes the whole sound spectrum of this area which ramifies its characteristics to different areas linked at the same time with those of linguistic character: Spanish, French, English and Dutch.

In this way, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Bahamas, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, Jamaica, haiti, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Aruba, Guyana, among others are part of the ethnic mosaic distinguishing this region. The Caribbean character (understood as wide range of expression embracing traditions, social behaviours, linguistic, historical and musical links) can be apply to certain towns in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Honduras, Guatemala and in the Latin American Diaspora in the united States, especially in New York. Thus, places so distant as Brazil can be considered as part of this identity where similar roots and cultural religious or carnival expressions in which the samba represents the African heritage just as happens in Cuba, Haiti, Trinidad, Jamaica and Bahamas.

In each country the African and European contributions differ in a considerable way depending on the intensity of the slave trade, immigration, type of economy, system of colonial government and of course, the way of grasping the expressive elements. However, facing common problems and claims, all Caribbean music from the ''Lamento Jibaro'' by Puerto Rican Rafael Hernández to ''Dem belly full but we hungry'' by Bob Marley in Jamaica, express frustrations of plundered towns and slums inhabitant's life.

In this area complex musical creole process gradually took place from 16th century where musical genres like Trinitarian Calypso, the Jamaican reggae, the Martinique biguine, the bomba, the plena and the seis from Puerto Rico, the cumbia and the vallenato from Colombia, the joropo from Venezuela, the Brazilian samba, the Dominican Bachata and merengue, the Cuban rumba and son as well as other more local manifestations like the aguinaldo, the soca, the mento, the tamborito or the zouk have acquired a strong Caribbean affirmation. Their diverse components have developed among themselves and continue influencing each other thanks to the migrations and different interchanges that have favored the Cuba's link with the Caribbean.

One of the most representative examples of this constant musical flow is the Caribbean_New Yorker salsa, a heterogeneous sound nourished by many traditional genres where the roots of our son are certainly recognized. Salsa has had its main manifestations in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Panama, Venezuela, Colombia and it has found in the city of New York a convergent point tom consolidate it and it contributes to its world difussion. Singers like Rubén Blades, Gilberto Santa Rosa,, Andy Montañez, Oscar D' León and music groups like La Sonora Ponceña, Dimensión Latina, guaco, Niche or the percussionist Tito Puentes known as El Rey del Timbal highlights among its main interpreters.

Cuban dance music has found in the songo, the salsa and in the contemporaneous timba, the historical continiuty of the son, an agglutinating genre that together with the rumba has become a source of inspiration for other artistic expressions. This music genre together with the Caribbean will be honored in this 8th edition of the International Fair CUBADISCO 2004.

Nerys González Bello and Liliana Casanella Cué.
Musicologists.