CONNECTING THE DOTS

LATIN AMERICA

In this class we travel to Latin America, where so many wonderful genres of music are the fusion of African, European and indigenous peoples' creativity and also tell of their struggles through song.

From the 1500's through the 1900's European colonial powers such as Spain, Portugal, France and England dominated the lands we now know as South America, Central America, the Caribbean islands and Mexico, for centuries forcing Africans into slavery and transporting them across the Atlantic to build "the New World." In the context of this history we, like the Africans, Europeans and the indigenous peoples in these tumultuous places, somehow, triumphantly, find a way to sing.

There are many nuances to the confluence of African, European and indigenous peoples' musics that resulted in the "Afro-Latin" genres of today, but the most direct story is that European song structures (linear, poetic) met African rhythms (cyclical and immersive) to fuse into entirely new styles like Cuban son, Colombian cumbia and Brazilian samba. In Haiti France was the dominant colonial power, leading to blended Afro-Caribbean musics like kompas. The British colonized islands like Jamaica, where African rhythms met British songs to become genres like mento, ska and reggae.

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