by Camuyano » Fri Dec 14, 2001 3:38 pm
Mike:
I can't speak for Cuba but in Puerto Rico where I grew up, Christmas is THE time of the year for traditional music. When I was growing up we were so influenced by American music that it was un-cool to listen to traditional music; however, Christmas was the one exception.
During Christmas groups that play traditional music try to sell as many records as they can. Christmas “aguinaldos”, which are traditional music featuring guitar, “cuatro”, congas, bongos, güiro, maracas, etc., are very popular during this time of the year as are “parrandas” where a group of people get together and haul their instruments (which often include congas) from house to house. They stand in front of a friend’s house and play “aguinaldos” until they open the door and invite them in for “asopao”, a thick soup made of chicken or beef.
As far as getting CDs, unless you are near an urban center where a lot of Puerto Ricans live such as New York or Miami I think you’re out of luck. Even then you may only find the more international types of music such as salsa, merengue and ballads. I live in suburban Virginia and depend on my parents to send me stuff like this since I can’t find it around here. I know that “El Gran Combo” and Willie Colón both have Christmas albums that are now classics, but that’s more salsa than anything.
“El Banco Popular”, which is one of the biggest banks in Latin American and the U.S., produces Christmas videos that have a high production value and feature traditional Puerto Rican music, but again I don’t know where you would get them. They also produced a DVD about the life of José Feliciano that features a lot of Puerto Rican music and even has English subtitles.
I hope this helps and apologize for the length of the message. Let me know if you want more info.