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Gil, S. (2015). "The Origins of Cuban Music and its Cultural and Spiritual Importance Within the Cuban
Diaspora Community." Inquiries Journal/Student Pulse, 7(10). Retrieved from
http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/a?id=1191

The Origins of Cuban Music and its Cultural and

Spiritual Importance Within the Cuban Diaspora
Community
By Sonia Gil

2015, Vol. 7 No. 10

 

This paper explores how the Cuban Diaspora has formed connections and forged a new identity around
music, meanwhile reinforcing the resiliency, adaptability, creativity and autonomy of the Cuban people in the
midst of crisis and uncertainty. Arts and culture are not just forms of entertainment, but messengers and
affirmations of culture and spirituality. These are all manifestations of a collective identity, which becomes
personal. Popular music acts as a conduit that people filter their own experiences through. Throughout Cuban
history, patterns of travel and emigration have molded the identity of the people and defined generations
(Gleason 113).

The origins of salsa and its predecessor, son cubano, of which little is known, are also discussed. The Afro-
Cuban son is rich with religious rituals and sensual dances, and there is a rich history behind its rhythm. My
objective is to show the psychosocial importance of this genre as it helped to shape and preserve the sense of
culture and identity that were stripped from the African diaspora that landed in the Caribbean as slaves.

I explore the son cubano and its offspring, salsa, as more than a popular genre of Latin dance music, but as
an agent of cultural preservation emblematic of the Afro-Caribbean religion Santería (“the way of the saints”
in English). Salsa music has its roots in the Afro-Cuban genre son cubano. The sundry rhythms of salsa can
be adapted to any mood, for it can be romantic and soft, spiritual and reflective, fierce and passionate,
melancholic and gloomy, or simply happy and energetic. There is usually a subliminal message embedded
within each song. Underneath the layers of percussive horns and fast-paced, exotic rhythms there is usually a
story that unveils the realities of the social struggles in the Hispanic community. These songs also reveal a
fierce determination to cultural roots and traditional values. Salsa embodies the essence of Spanish speaking
Afro-Caribbean culture, religion and history (Gleason; 113 Mancuso 28).

Historical and Ancestral Origins

Son music has roots in Yoruban sacred music which originates from Nigeria. African based religions arrived
in Cuba around the late 1500s during the inception of slavery (Hodges 35; Leymarie 10). Its folkloric
tradition is surrounded by mysterious rituals, burnt offerings and animal sacrifices to the Gods. In those days,
Afro-Cuban slaves circumvented Catholicism, the new religion imposed upon them, by melding with their
own to give the appearance of having assimilated Catholicism (Díaz; Hodges 18-19; Leymarie 12).

The slaves did not relinquish their culture; they substituted the names of their African gods with the names of
the Catholic saints. For example, Obatalá became the Creator, God Himself as monotheistic religions
describe this all-encompassing spiritual guiding force. Their god of war Changó was renamed Santa Bárbara
or Saint Barbara. Yemayá, the sea goddess became the Virgin of Regla, an outlying suburb of Havana. Their
native prayers were translated from Yoruba to Spanish; which later evolved into a liturgical language called
Lucumí, a Cuban dialect of Yoruba.

This linguistic evolution was the birth of creolized Spanish in Cuba. Regla de ocha, another name for
Santería, is an animist religion that combines Yoruban (e.g. Nigerian) rituals with Catholic ones. Regla de
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ocha means the rule of ocha. This forms the basis for the worship of the orishas or African gods. Santería
faith is unique because it is truly a creation of the Americas. Santeros or shaman priests in Cuba speak
Lucumí to this day. The slaves were so successful in their dissimulation of the Catholicism faith into their
own that even some slave owners unwittingly participated in their slaves’ Santería rituals believing it to be a
black form of entertainment. They were enchanted by the intoxicating sound of the drums, as female slaves
performed intensely erotic movements during fertility ceremonies. Indeed, Santería music and dance is so
beautifully hypnotic, it is easy to get lost in ecstasy, and fall into a trance (Concha-Holmes; Díaz; Gutiérrez
308; Gleason 114; Leymarie 10-13; Mancuso 28-29).

There are parallels between music, spirituality, food and sexuality in Hispanic musical forms. Music in Cuba
does not just feed the soul and mind; but the senses as well. This explains the erotic and sensuous
connotations to it. The five senses form part of a greater whole rather than compartments to be indulged in at
different times; like clockwork that must be scheduled (Leymarie 4-5). Sandunga means elegance and grace
in Spanish. Cuban musicologist Fernando Ortiz described the Africanized word as salt and pepper. The salt
being from Andalusia (white) and the ndungu pepper (black) being from Africa. Just to clarify, Andalusia is
a province in Southern Spain close to Morocco and Algeria with a strong Moorish influence. That province
is where the majority of Hispanics of European descent came from.

This mixture reminds me of the traditional Cuban dish of moros y cristianos or Moors and Christians. The
savory and aromatic dish is rice cooked in black beans, which is not the same as white rice and black beans.
Moros y cristianos looks like a perfectly blended rice and bean dish because it is monochromatic. From a
culinary standpoint, this is representative of the all of blends that took place across cultures. Cuba’s music
combines the African languages (e.g. Abakwa, Yoruba and Congo among others) with Spanish. Very little
exists of Cuba’s indigenous roots; except for güiros and the maracas (Díaz; Leymarie 9-17).

The Yoruban people, or Lucumí as named in Cuba, helped to establish present-day Cuban culture on the
island. Before the Cuban diaspora could take their music and culture abroad, African slaves were the first
group of people who saw themselves in the situation to take their culture wherever they were sent. They
replicated the African musical instruments that they were forced to leave behind. They incorporated
European instruments such as mandolins, guitars, tubas and ophicleide (in the brass family) among others
into their repertoire. The African diaspora traveled through other mediums outside of the continent as
evidence by the strong cultural influence in the Spanish Caribbean, e.g. Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican
Republic, Panama, Colombia Venezuela and others (Leymarie 10).

The Bantu people were also known as the Congos in Cuba. These people assimilated themselves more
quickly into white society than other African tribes. As a result, their religious traditions watered down
somewhat as the collective Cuban identity emerged. “Conga” means song and tumult in Bantu. Mambo
means prayer, a conversation with gods and sacred dance; and “mamba” means water goddess in the Congo
language. Congo songs are full of satire, piques and disparates or nonsense in English. Some Congo prayers
incorporated the Arabic salute salaamu aleikum, which in Cuban Spanish became salamaleco.

The Araras, another African tribe, descended from the Fon people of the Dahomey kingdom or present-day
Benin. Araras descendants can be found in the cities of Matanzas and Jovellanos, which are roughly two
hours east of Havana. The remnants of their culture and religion were absorbed into the Yoruba tradition and
pantheon. The Abakwa (e.g. Carabalí or more informally, ñáñigos in Cuba) hail from the coast of Calabar in
southeastern Nigeria and comprise of people from Ibo, Ibibio Ejagham and other tribes. During the
nineteenth century all of these tribes formed secret societies in Havana, Matanzas and Cárdenas. The cabildo
evolved and took on a life of its own and a few still exist in Matanzas to this day (Concha-Holmes 490;
Leymarie 15-17).

During the seventeenth century, free blacks in the outskirts of the cities resisted colonial leaders and created
their own town councils or cabildos. These councils comprised of different African ethnic groups. The
meetings were an organized affair and operated much like a club where people worshipped, played music,
assisted each other, engaged in activities of recreation and eventually organized resistance movements.
Colonial interference came in ebbs and flows as it was on a case by case basis.

Some political leaders tolerated the cabildos presence as a form of entertainment during carnivals as part of a
comparsa or singing and dancing group; while at other times they were banned. Despite these uncertainties,

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Afro-Cubans persisted, even if that meant going underground. It can be speculated that in these secret
meetings where the early sounds of son were born. Afro-Cuban culture continued to proliferate during
slavery; and in 1831 there were three times as many black musicians as there were white (Concha-Homles
490-492; Gleason 113; Leymarie 10-11, 19).

The African tribes’ religious music later evolved into secular music in Cuba. The blending of the sacred with
the profane is nothing new in Cuba. This bonding and sacred ritual in religion became part of the social
contract for the nation forming its identity. The central theme of the thesis will be the son cubano, the
backbone of salsa and Cuba’s heart according to Ibrahim Ferrer. Cubans took their religion, culture, musical
traditions and souls with them when they emigrated the island in the 1960’s. They collaborated with the
people of the country that now lived in be it the United States, Spain, Puerto Rico, Venezuela and created a
cultural hybrid. This combination helped to create new musical forms such as salsa or bring another
dimension to diverse musical genres such as Latin and American pop, jazz, disco and rhythm and blues
(Leymarie 31, 208, 231).

The Merging of the American Gulf Coast with Cuba

New Orleans and Cuba have a virtually identical multiethnic background that consists of African, Italian,
French, Native American and Spanish heritage. Both places lie on the edges of the Gulf of Mexico and the
Caribbean Sea. But the Gulf connects and disconnects these cultures not unlike the Mediterranean Sea which
acts as its own unofficial “cultural confederation.” South Louisiana, Cuba, Mexico (e.g. the states of
Veracruz and Tamaulipas), and other countries in this region share similar though not identical cultural
elements. New Orleans is the first major city on the southern tip of the Mississippi River, which acts as a
cultural launching pad in the United States. Similarly, Cuba is in the middle of the Caribbean Sea that
connects with greater Latin America. The island nation has created many genres of music that have
reverberated across the Hispanic Americas. New Orleans and Havana are only 694 miles apart from each
other (Stewart 1).

Prior to the embargo, the cities of Havana and New Orleans were along twin trade routes crisscrossing the
Gulf of Mexico. Goods not only traveled but so did people. This exchange enabled a broad cultural exchange
between the metropolises. New Orleans and Havana were widely regarded at the turn of the nineteenth
century as a prime tourist destination for entertainment. In 1809, nine thousand Cuban immigrants arrived in
New Orleans. Of these first wave refugees, about a third were white (mostly of French descent), another
third were free persons of color (usually ethnically mixed French Creoles) and the other third were slaves.
These people were émigrés from the French colony of Saint Domingue which later became Haiti (Stewart 1-
2).

The Saint Domingues first appealed for refuge in Cuba in 1803 due to the Haitian Slave Uprising which
spanned from 1791 to 1804. Their six-year stay in Cuba was marked with tensions and suspicion. Marquis de
Somerueles, Captain General of Cuba, commanded that all of the “Frenchmen” or negros franceses be exiled
as their presence may be a threat to the island. According to Stewart, “Frenchmen” comprised of anybody
who originated from Saint Domingue (e.g. modern day Haiti) regardless of their social status or race. The
remaining Haitians that did not set for Louisiana mainly settled in the eastern Cuban province of Oriente.
They established their own recreational socities called tumbas francesas French paths. Some Haitian-Cuban
communities practice vodú or voodoo with musical instruments found in Haiti to this day (Leymarie 18;
Stewart 1-2).

The Saint Domingue immigrants made New Orleans their new permanent home. New Orleans suffered from
a dearth of musicians in 1810. By 1811 the musical crisis improved a little, which suggests that “some of the
refugees were musicians.” The ingenuity, adaptability and strength of Afro-Caribbeans cannot be
underestimated. They found the way to turn the worst of circumstances into a new and beautiful sound
(Stewart 1-2).

Afro-Cuban jazz musicians at the turn of the twentieth century collaborated with New Orleans jazz
musicians. Culturally, two creolized communities in the Americas banded forces to enhance each other’s
repertoire. In turn, the two societies reshaped their own ethnic identities on their own terms. Despite the fact
that there are Cubans dispersed across the world, their music acts as an umbilical cord which gives their life
sustenance, meaning and a sense of familiarity (Stewart 1, 8). Regardless of one’s spiritual affiliation or lack
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thereof, there are moments in a person’s life in which there are invisible and subtle forces at play that support
one in this journey that is called life. That is the power of music at its best.

Cuba and New Orleans maintained their relationship from the 1930’s to the early 1960’s. Cuban entertainers
traveled to New Orleans regularly and appeared “at both black and white music venues.” Wealthy Creole
businessmen took frequent vacations to Cuba where racial divisions were less restrictive than the United
States. Cuba’s color structure is reminiscent of French Louisiana or present-day southern Louisiana where
racial boundaries were often blurry; and one’s family lineage and cultural background were of great
importance. After the triumph of the Revolution, some Cubans with a New Orleans tie relocated there
(Stewart 8).

A New Ethnic and Racial Identity

According to Assata Shakur, “El que no tiene de Congo tiene de Carabalí” (Leymarie 10; Safa 88). In
English this means: If one does not have Congo in them, they have Carabalí. In other words, Cuba’s African
presence is undeniable regardless of one’s actual ancestry. The ideal Cuban is mulatto or of mixed race. They
embody the island’s African and European heritage. These mixed roots became Cuba’s national symbol. It
embodied an image of true racial harmony irrespective of the nation’s complex and turbulent racial politics
(Benítez-Rojo 179-180).

Although racial mixing in the Caribbean was encouraged, sometimes it became an act of necessity or
survival. Most if not all of the colonizers were male and their families remained in Europe until the coast was
clear to settle in the Americas. In the interim, some European men had relationships with indigenous and
African slave women that produced offspring. This notion of national and ethnic identity runs parallel “with
the negative view of race mixture in the United States” and enforced ethnic diversity (Díaz; Hodges 29, 33-
34; Safa 89).

Despite the strong African roots that Cuba has, racism still exists. It is a contradiction that black religion,
culture and music are revered, yet nobody wants to be moreno or negro, black in Spanish. These beliefs are
rooted in colonialism and slavery where the madre patria or motherland is held in high esteem. Spain is
universally seen in mainstream Latin America as the madre patria. For a sizeable group that place would be
West Africa; while the remaining people of indigenous origin are already home. This is not counting the
people of Jewish, Chinese, Filipino, Arabic and other non-Spanish European ancestry who settled into the
Spanish Caribbean (Díaz).

Though Cuba and the Spanish Caribbean have a strong black presence, there are not many artists of color are
represented in the mainstream Latin music market. The few artists of color that are represented remain the
same, indicating a lack of diversity. The only reason that the socialist regime did not completely outlaw
African based religions (e.g. Santería) was because they did not perceive it as a threat to the establishment.
On the surface, it seems that there is acceptance for diversity, but it is more of an act of convenience and a
way to appease the people in a society where religion was outlawed after Castro’s presidency. Afro-Cuban
religion does not interfere with politics as it is not an organized religion. Thus, the Cuban people still had a
spiritual life in spite of the new restrictions (Díaz; Sigler).

The Politics Behind Cuban Music

Politics and music are tightly interwoven throughout Cuban history. There were laws in the books that were
religiously based and thus formed a collective morality which citizens had to abide by. Article 26 of the 1910
Cuban constitution stated that one was free to proclaim any religion as a form of worship without any
respects so long as Christian moral values and public decorum were respected. The language of this article
gave the government carte blanche to interpret and define what was “considered respectful, regarding
Christian morals and the public order.”

The article embodied a contradiction with respects to son due to its connotations with animist African
religions, far from the European Judeo-Christian model. African religions were the blueprint for secular
Cuban music. Due to this backhanded language, the government could interfere in nonwhite cultural
manifestations on the premise that they encouraged immorality. Although the majority of the opposition to

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son was the white Cuban elite, there was a sizeable black middle class that supported the censorship of son
(Chambers 504).

The most vociferous group was the Afro-Cuban association named Club Atenas. This exclusive association
had leading members of the black intelligentsia such as prominent Cuban sociologist Gustavo Urrutia, whom
promoted the advancement and incorporation of Cubans of color in all branches of society. According to
Alejandro de la Fuente many of the presidents of Club Atenas “were members of Congress or held important
government offices at the national level or both between the creation of the club in 1917 and the end of the
republic.”

The actions of the Club Atenas body were contrary as they rejected their African roots and assimilated
European culture. Club Atenas viewed itself as promoting more prosocial behaviors in the Afro Cuban
community. However, many leading members were politicians in close association with white Congress
members. Thus, they were sorely out of touch with the average Afro-Cuban José or Josefina (Chambers
504).

From 1928 to 1933 Cuba’s leaders periodically banned playing son in public. “African” instruments were
less tolerated than the “European” ones. Minister Rogelio Zayas Bazán banned movies, tried to shut down
dance academies, and even fined men who flirted with women in public. In 1929, Gerardo Machado, the
mayor of Santiago, prohibited congas and bongos. African musical instruments were treated like weapons of
mass destruction not unlike the days of slavery. Cuba’s conservative movement restricted sexuality and
creative expression. Music was a racialized affair during Cuba’s segregation era. The Europeans continued to
manifest the attitude that the former black slaves as the other. Integration was impossible (Leymarie 44-45).

History as a tool for creating a new national identity was pivotal to the success of the Revolution as it
symbolized a symbiosis of the island’s new and future collective experiences. This discipline was not treated
like a spectator sport. It became an object used to impulse and mobilize citizens into action and feel a
renewed pride in their heritage and culture. Castro rallied Afro-Cubans behind his Revolution and
refashioned the island nation as an Afro-Latin nation or an appendage of Mother Africa.

This replaced the traditional notion of the motherland, at least for Cubans on the island. However, many
Cubans in the United States still maintained that Spain was the madre patria. Interestingly enough, Fidel
Castro is of Galician descent in northwestern Spain. The concept and irony of sandunga is not lost here
(Díaz; Domínguez 8).

In the beginning of the Cuban Revolution, a vigorous censorship campaign was launched aimed at silencing
two of the oldest and most intrinsically rooted religions in the island of Cuba: Santería and Catholicism. That
was a tall order considering that the Spanish colonialists tried to erase Santería from the psyche of the
African slaves that were shipped to Cuba in the 1500s with negative results. Despite the hostile political
climate and harsh prohibitions, Afro-Cuban music could not be silenced (Díaz; Hodges).

Somewhere along the way, Castro had a change of heart. The reasons for this change are complex and are
rooted in politics as much as personal values. It is suggested that El Comandante himself turned to the
Yoruban faith as a means to find healing and protection from enemies (Boadle; González 264; Harvey;
Sigler). His 1980 trip to Africa appeared to be a turning to point for him. He wore all white during his visit
and was surrounded by Santeros. This is the color that Santería adherents use for their priests and their
apprentices (González 261-266). Santería is a religion based on peace and palliative treatments (Sigler).

Remarkably, Afro-Cubans managed to outwit Castro’s sanctions on the practice of this religion and its
associated music in Cuba. When one observes the parallels with colonial history to modern history, there are
similarities in the way Afro-Cubans circumvented Spanish imposed Catholicism then and now. This time,
they left out the Roman Catholic influence of Santería. The Santeros did this because the regime viewed
most organized religions as a threat. Santería is not an officially recognized religion around the world.

This proved to the communists that their rituals were not a menace to the system; and thus they were able to
evade censorship and possible incarceration. Since the government imposed great roadblocks to organized
religion such as increased surveillance and harassment; Santería became a safer alternative to worship and
have a sense of community in a new society that left many feeling disoriented (Díaz; Leymarie; Sigler).

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One could argue that this is what the gods may have wanted for Cuba because the Santeros had to revert
back to a more pure form of Afro-Cuban Santería (Boadle). They incorporated more religious music into
their rituals, which spread throughout the island like wildfire. During this renaissance phase of Santería, the
government became more lax in enforcing the ban (Harvey). This seemed to appease the Cuban people. It
also gave rise to a revival of the Yourba-Lucumí culture with a Cuban twist. In many ways, this proved to be
beneficial to Castro’s government because Cuba has excellent diplomatic and cultural relations with all
African nations (Díaz).

As times changed and Cuban musicians arrived in the United States, the son cubano evolved into what today
is known as salsa. Unlike any other genre of music, a paradoxical bond exists between Cuban son,
Catholicism and socialism. This strange relationship has enabled it to endure the religious and political
censorship in Cuba as it had done centuries before during slavery. The music and rituals have survived in
spite of the socialist ideology and censorship of the last century (Sigler).

Beneath the surface of its intoxicating cadence and spiritual notes, the political and elements that hide
beneath this art form transcends past and present folklore and culture around the world. Few musical genres
have been able to achieve this seamlessly (Díaz).

New Avenues for Son to Be Heard

Son was “recorded and promoted by large American corporations such as RCA Victor.” The United States
established an omnipresent presence on the island between the late 19th century and the turn of the 20th
century. Interestingly enough, the Americans elite accepted the son and they had the political and economic
influence to make this maligned form of music go global. And it did. The Cuban elites were nowhere near as
receptive as the Americans.

In fact, they were hostile to the notion that Afro-Cuban music would define the Cuban identity. The
aristocracy could only accept these Afro-Latin rhythms as a benign influence in Cuban dance and song rather
than a symbol of nation. Had Cuba’s ruling class accepted the son in its inception, they would have had to
accept its collective African heritage and propagate that abroad (Chambers 503).

Although music formed an avenue for transculturation in Cuba, the cultural transition was not smooth by any
means. The background behind the sensual and exciting son perpetuated the frictions “between Cuban elites
and the masses to define lo cubano” or what is Cuban. The elites looked to Europe and the United States “for
representations of culture and modernity;” while the black and mulatto communities assembled a musical
genre that became an icon of Cuban culture and identity (Chambers 497).

The Emergence of a New American Music

Salsa emerged in New York City in the early 1960s, when a group of disenfranchised Cuban musicians
arrived in the United States fleeing the censorship of the new communist regime in their country. These
Cuban maestros also collaborated with some of the greatest jazz musicians of the times, such as Dizzy
Gillespie (García 195). From those sessions Latin jazz was born and became a new genre. This called the
attention of Puerto Rican band leaders such as Willy Colón, Tito Puente and other musicians.

At the time, the most popular Puerto Rican sounds heard were plena, bomba, and boleros. The name “salsa”
was coined by Tito Puente, who appeared on TV commercials regularly advertising Goya Food products,
such as “salsa de tomate” or tomato sauce. This product was one of Goya’s most popular products on the
Hispanic market in those days, due in part to Tito Puente’s popularity and charisma. “Salsa” became a
catchphrase that Puente used during his guest appearances to describe the essence of the new music that had
emerged from his collaboration with the Cubans. That was the birth of salsa as the United States, and the rest
of the world, as it is known today. “Salsa” gave voice to the Hispanic community during the post-industrial
era of the late 1960’s through 1970’s when employment opportunities became scarce, neighborhoods and
families disintegrated as a result (Díaz; Singer and Martínez 177-179).

The arrival of the son gave composers the freedom to innovate and improvise with Afro-Cuban lyrics. This
genre of music is best viewed as part of the bedrock of “traditional musical forms of the Spanish speaking

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Caribbean.” It highlights the best integration of the religions the Afro-Hispanic community incorporated
(African religion and Catholicism), which defined the culture in that region (Gutiérrez 297-298).

Son de la Loma by Trío Matamoros depicts a conversation between a child and mother. Lomas are hills;
however, the song carries a multidimensional meaning because African spirits live in the hills of the
wilderness. The woods are the designated place for the spirits and dead. The final interpretation can be
derived that the “singers live with those sacred spirits” and that is the place where they derive their special
talents (Gutiérrez 298).

Esa música que heredamos (This music that we inherit)

Hijos y nietos de los africanos (African sons and daughters)

La que mezclamos con la española, (That mixed with the Spanish,)

Con la francesa y la portuguesa, (With the French and Portuguese,)

La que fundimos bien con la inglesa (That we fused well with the English)

Los Van Van, “Somos cubanos” “We are Cubans” (Hernández-Reguant 31)

The Post-Industrial Effect on Music in Cuba and the United States

As the son morphed into salsa, post-Revolution Cuba was the breeding ground for timba, a blend of Ibero-
American and Iberian musical styles such as the Spanish flamenco. Timba was created by and for black
people in Cuba. It shined a light on Afro-Cuban heritage and pride as a lifeline to Cuban identity, “machismo
and sexuality.” On the flipside, timba depicts “Cuban mulatto women as gold diggers, whores and race
traitors.” This is not unlike some of the misogynistic themes found in hip-hop music (Hernández-Reguant 32,
35).

Curiously enough, both timba and hip-hop became popular in the 1980’s and served as a voice for sullen and
disenfranchised young men. During this decade, the United States was gripped by a crack and cocaine
epidemic as well as a job base that was outsourced abroad, and an administration that displayed a nonchalant
and casually judgmental attitude with respects to the disadvantaged. Cuba also suffered greatly in 1980’s
from the effects of the dissolution of the Soviet Union as the island’s embargo and socialist government’s
policies nearly strangled its economy and people. This was the catalyst for the Special Period in Time of
Peace era of the 1990’s where the government instituted strict rations on the consumption of fuel, food and
resources (Hernández-Reguant 31).

It was not a surprise that some beautiful women on the island left with and sometimes married white
Europeans as a way to improve their dire circumstances. As a result, Afro-Cuban men felt abandoned and
cast out. The true nature of said problems lies in broken economic policies and politicking rather than loose
and materialistic women. Although men in both countries may have been aware of the scope of their
tribulations, women became “a scapegoat as she is the last thing that he can try to control and identify a
common heritage with.” It is also important to note that women play no significant role in timba. Despite the
strides that feminism made in Cuba and the U.S., women were still the weakest link and became a popular
target in arts and entertainment (Hernández-Reguant).

Although the United States and Cuba had certain post-industrial similarities in their society, there are key
differences between the lives of blacks in both countries. Cuba instituted a requirement to provide free access
to vocational programs, medical treatment, sports and the arts that benefitted the community and reduce
social endangerment. These measures were successfully carried out despite their budget shortfalls.

On the other hand, post-industrial (i.e. late 1970’s and beyond) United States began to see sharp contrasts
between well-to-do African-Americans climbing a corporate ladder that became available for them to climb
post-Civil Rights Era, and their socioeconomically disadvantaged counterparts (Díaz).

Timba was the Cuban man’s response to post-feminist society. The same could be argued for American hip-
hop. I want to clarify that chauvinism is nothing new in Cuban or American music. However, in pre-
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Revolution Cuba and pre-sexual revolution America it was cloaked in veiled romanticism sometimes mixed
with perilous passions in the name of love for a woman. Now that women have more sociopolitical mobility,
some men took the regressive route to respond to the perception of loss of authority in their lives and that of
women (Hernández-Reguant 33, 35).

Beyond Latin America and the United States

These collaborations went beyond the Spanish speaking world. Afro-Cuban music became Senegal’s song
during the Independence period of the 1960’s when that generation assumed power. Embracing Latin music
embodied a zeitgeist tropical attitude not unlike the feelings that the balmy beaches of West Africa can elicit.
This newly created set of acceptable norms by the Senegalese formed a solid base for a sustainable post-
colonial society.

Preserving Afro-Cuban music in Senegal maintained and solidified these traditions; thus allowing the newly
liberated nation to act as free agents political life. Viewing and participating in the Afro-Cuban performance
created a safe space “where generational rivalries and differing notions of cosmopolitanism” are acted out
and mediated in a controlled environment (Shain 187-188).

Culture is one of the only means that marginalized groups found to be included into the mainstream in post-
colonial societies such as Cuba and the United States. They created their own capital and culture is its
biggest and most valuable export. One would hope that the creators of these valuable works would become
financially wealthy. Instead, people of European descent appropriate African-derived cultural such as dance,
music, food, and religious practices. (Chambers 497).

In Closing

The African diaspora arose from “several centuries of institutionalized slavery.” That was the motor for
“cultural, racial and ethnic” exchanges and mixtures which still serve as a blueprint in the arts today.
“African languages make up an intrinsic part of many Cuban music genres.” For five centuries, Cuban music
is the end result of the unique meetings that emerged from diverse cultures “that reached the island in one
way or another” (Gutiérrez 295-296; Hodges; Leymarie).

The orishas have mutable qualities and have no boundaries because they are spirits (Concha-Holmes 490).
For devotees of Santería and other African based religions, these gods are eternal. Yemayá can be found in
Lagos, Nigeria as much as Miami or Madrid. She is wherever you invoke her (Gleason). Spirituality is like
water, one sees it but may not know or understand the molecules contained in it. Achieving and maintain that
purity lies in the practitioner and the forces one chooses to blend with. If the person neglects their water, it
will dissipate into the atmosphere. Once that happens, the person loses an intrinsic part of their history.

Afro-Cuban musical history can teach musicians and vocalists irrespective of genre and language that there
is so much more to this craft than meets the naked eye. One becomes an interpreter and bridge to another
world, both past and present. Devotion and sacrifice is required of the artist in order to receive a gift that can
be shared with others. It is important that musicians distance themselves from the notion of grooming
themselves for a fickle marketplace in order to have lasting impact and success.

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