Performing Afro Cuba

Download Performing Afro Cuba full books in PDF, epub, and Kindle. Read online Performing Afro Cuba ebook anywhere anytime directly on your device. Fast Download speed and no annoying ads. We cannot guarantee that every ebooks is available!

Performing Afro-Cuba

Author : Kristina Wirtz
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 022611919X
Total Pages : 344 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (261 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Performing Afro-Cuba by : Kristina Wirtz

Download or read book Performing Afro-Cuba written by Kristina Wirtz and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2014-06-05 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Visitors to Cuba will notice that Afro-Cuban figures and references are everywhere: in popular music and folklore shows, paintings and dolls of Santería saints in airport shops, and even restaurants with plantation themes. In Performing Afro-Cuba, Kristina Wirtz examines how the animation of Cuba’s colonial past and African heritage through such figures and performances not only reflects but also shapes the Cuban experience of Blackness. She also investigates how this process operates at different spatial and temporal scales—from the immediate present to the imagined past, from the barrio to the socialist state. Wirtz analyzes a variety of performances and the ways they construct Cuban racial and historical imaginations. She offers a sophisticated view of performance as enacting diverse revolutionary ideals, religious notions, and racial identity politics, and she outlines how these concepts play out in the ongoing institutionalization of folklore as an official, even state-sponsored, category. Employing Bakhtin’s concept of “chronotopes”—the semiotic construction of space-time—she examines the roles of voice, temporality, embodiment, imagery, and memory in the racializing process. The result is a deftly balanced study that marries racial studies, performance studies, anthropology, and semiotics to explore the nature of race as a cultural sign, one that is always in process, always shifting.

Divine Utterances

Author : Katherine J. Hagedorn
Publisher : National Geographic Books
ISBN 13 : 1560989475
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (69 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Divine Utterances by : Katherine J. Hagedorn

Download or read book Divine Utterances written by Katherine J. Hagedorn and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2001-08-17 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Divine Utterances, Katherine J. Hagedorn explores the enduring cultural and spiritual power of the music of Afro-Cuban Santería and the process by which it has been transformed for a secular audience. She focuses on the integral connections between sacred music performances and the dramatizations of theatrical troupes, especially the state-sponsored Conjunto Folklórico Nacional de Cuba, and examines the complex relationships involving race, politics, and religion in Cuba. The music that Hagedorn describes is rooted in Afro-Cuban religious tradition and today pervades a secular performances that can produce a trance in audience members in the same way as a traditional religious ceremony. Hagedorn's analysis is deeply informed by her experiences in Cuba as a woman, scholar, and apprentice batá drummer. She argues that constructions of race and gender, the politics of pre- and post-Revolutionary Cuba, the economics of tourism, and contemporary practices within Santería have contributed to a blurring of boundaries betwen the sacred and the folkloric. As both modes now vie for primacy in Cuba's burgeoning tourist trade, what had once been the music of a marginalized group is now a cultural expression of national pride. The compact disc that accompanies the book includes examples of twenty songs to the orichas, or Afro-Cuban deities, performed by prominent musicians, including Lázaro Ros, Francisco Aguabella, Alberto Villarreal, and Zenaida Armenteros.

Suspect Freedoms

Author : Nancy Raquel Mirabal
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 0814761127
Total Pages : 325 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (147 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Suspect Freedoms by : Nancy Raquel Mirabal

Download or read book Suspect Freedoms written by Nancy Raquel Mirabal and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2017-01-10 with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beginning in the early nineteenth century, Cubans migrated to New York City to organize and protest against Spanish colonial rule. While revolutionary wars raged in Cuba, expatriates envisioned, dissected, and redefined meanings of independence and nationhood. An underlying element was the concept of Cubanidad, a shared sense of what it meant to be Cuban. Deeply influenced by discussions of slavery, freedom, masculinity, and United States imperialism, the question of what and who constituted “being Cuban” remained in flux and often, suspect. The first book to explore Cuban racial and sexual politics in New York during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Suspect Freedoms chronicles the largely unexamined and often forgotten history of more than a hundred years of Cuban exile, migration, diaspora, and community formation. Nancy Raquel Mirabal delves into the rich cache of primary sources, archival documents, literary texts, club records, newspapers, photographs, and oral histories to write what Michel Rolph Trouillot has termed an “unthinkable history.” Situating this pivotal era within larger theoretical discussions of potential, future, visibility, and belonging, Mirabal shows how these transformations complicated meanings of territoriality, gender, race, power, and labor. She argues that slavery, nation, and the fear that Cuba would become “another Haiti” were critical in the making of early diasporic Cubanidades, and documents how, by the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Afro-Cubans were authors of their own experiences; organizing movements, publishing texts, and establishing important political, revolutionary, and social clubs. Meticulously documented and deftly crafted, Suspect Freedoms unravels a nuanced and vital history.

Unbecoming Blackness

Author : Antonio Lopez
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 0814765475
Total Pages : 287 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (147 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Unbecoming Blackness by : Antonio Lopez

Download or read book Unbecoming Blackness written by Antonio Lopez and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2012-11-26 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2014 Runner-Up, MLA Prize in United States Latina and Latino and Chicana and Chicano Literary and Cultural Studies In Unbecoming Blackness, Antonio López uncovers an important, otherwise unrecognized century-long archive of literature and performance that reveals Cuban America as a space of overlapping Cuban and African diasporic experiences. López shows how Afro-Cuban writers and performers in theU.S. align Cuban black and mulatto identities, often subsumed in the mixed-race and postracial Cuban national imaginaries, with the material and symbolic blackness of African Americans and other Afro-Latinas/os. In the works of Alberto O’Farrill, Eusebia Cosme, Rómulo Lachatañeré, and others, Afro-Cubanness articulates the African diasporic experience in ways that deprive negro and mulato configurations of an exclusive link with Cuban nationalism. Instead, what is invoked is an “unbecoming” relationship between Afro-Cubans in the U.S and their domestic black counterparts. The transformations in Cuban racial identity across the hemisphere, represented powerfully in the literary and performance cultures of Afro-Cubans in the U.S., provide the fullest account of a transnational Cuba, one in which the Cuban American emerges as Afro-Cuban-American, and the Latino as Afro-Latino.

From Afro-Cuban Rhythms to Latin Jazz

Author : Raul A. Fernandez
Publisher : Univ of California Press
ISBN 13 : 0520939441
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (29 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis From Afro-Cuban Rhythms to Latin Jazz by : Raul A. Fernandez

Download or read book From Afro-Cuban Rhythms to Latin Jazz written by Raul A. Fernandez and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2006-05-23 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the complexity of Cuban dance music and the webs that connect it, musically and historically, to other Caribbean music, to salsa, and to Latin Jazz. Establishing a scholarly foundation for the study of this music, Raul A. Fernandez introduces a set of terms, definitions, and empirical information that allow for a broader, more informed discussion. He presents fascinating musical biographies of prominent performers Cachao López, Mongo Santamaría, Armando Peraza, Patato Valdés, Francisco Aguabella, Cándido Camero, Chocolate Armenteros, and Celia Cruz. Based on interviews that the author conducted over a nine-year period, these profiles provide in-depth assessments of the musicians’ substantial contributions to both Afro-Cuban music and Latin Jazz. In addition, Fernandez examines the links between Cuban music and other Caribbean musics; analyzes the musical and poetic foundations of the Cuban son form; addresses the salsa phenomenon; and develops the aesthetic construct of sabor, central to Cuban music. Copub: Center for Black Music Research

The Artistry of Afro-Cuban Batá Drumming

Author : Kenneth Schweitzer
Publisher : Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN 13 : 1617036706
Total Pages : 257 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (17 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis The Artistry of Afro-Cuban Batá Drumming by : Kenneth Schweitzer

Download or read book The Artistry of Afro-Cuban Batá Drumming written by Kenneth Schweitzer and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2013-02-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An iconic symbol and sound of the Lucumí/Santería religion, Afro-Cuban batá are talking drums that express the epic mythological narratives of the West African Yoruba deities known as orisha. By imitating aspects of speech and song, and by metaphorically referencing salient attributes of the deities, batá drummers facilitate the communal praising of orisha in a music ritual known as a toque de santo. In The Artistry of Afro-Cuban Batá Drumming, Kenneth Schweitzer blends musical transcription, musical analysis, interviews, ethnographic descriptions, and observations from his own experience as a ritual drummer to highlight the complex variables at work during a live Lucumí performance. Integral in enabling trance possessions by the orisha, by far the most dramatic expressions of Lucumí faith, batá drummers are also entrusted with controlling the overall ebb and flow of the four- to six-hour toque de santo. During these events, batá drummers combine their knowledge of ritual with an extensive repertoire of rhythms and songs. Musicians focus on the many thematic acts that unfold both concurrently and in quick succession. In addition to creating an emotionally charged environment, playing salute rhythms for the orisha, and supporting the playful song competitions that erupt between singers, batá drummers are equally dedicated to nurturing their own drumming community by creating a variety of opportunities for the musicians to grow artistically and creatively.

Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance

Author : Umi Vaughan
Publisher : University of Michigan Press
ISBN 13 : 0472028693
Total Pages : 203 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (72 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance by : Umi Vaughan

Download or read book Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance written by Umi Vaughan and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2012-10-17 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance shows how community music-makers and dancers take in all that is around them socially and globally, and publicly and bodily unfold their memories, sentiments, and raw responses within open spaces designated or commandeered for local popular dance. As an African American anthropologist, musician, dancer, and photographer who lived in Cuba, Vaughan reveals a unique perspective on contemporary Cuban society during the 1990s, the peak decade of timba, and beyond, as the Cuban leadership transferred from Fidel Castro to his brother. Simultaneously, the book reveals popular dance music in the context of a young and astutely educated Cuban generation of fierce and creative performers. By looking at the experiences of black Cubans and exploring the notion of “Afro Cuba,” Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance explains timba's evolution and achieved significance in the larger context of Cuban culture. Vaughan discusses a maroon aesthetic extended beyond the colonial era to the context of contemporary society; describes the dance spaces of Cuba; and examines the performance of identity and desire through the character of the “especulador.”

Situated Narratives and Sacred Dance

Author : Jill Flanders Crosby
Publisher : University Press of Florida
ISBN 13 : 1683403797
Total Pages : 274 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (834 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Situated Narratives and Sacred Dance by : Jill Flanders Crosby

Download or read book Situated Narratives and Sacred Dance written by Jill Flanders Crosby and published by University Press of Florida. This book was released on 2023-02-14 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using storytelling and performance to explore shared religious expression across continents Through a revolutionary ethnographic approach that foregrounds storytelling and performance as alternative means of knowledge, Situated Narratives and Sacred Dance explores shared ritual traditions between the Anlo-Ewe people of West Africa and their descendants, the Arará of Cuba, who were brought to the island in the transatlantic slave trade. The volume draws on two decades of research in four communities: Dzodze, Ghana; Adjodogou, Togo; and Perico and Agramonte, Cuba. In the ceremonies, oral narratives, and daily lives of individuals at each fieldsite, the authors not only identify shared attributes in religious expression across continents, but also reveal lasting emotional, spiritual, and personal impacts in the communities whose ancestors were ripped from their homeland and enslaved. The authors layer historiographic data, interviews, and fieldnotes with artistic modes such as true fiction, memoir, and choreographed narrative, challenging the conventional nature of scholarship with insights gained from sensorial experience. Including reflections on the making of an art installation based on this research project, the volume challenges readers to imagine the potential of approaching fieldwork as artists. The authors argue that creative methods can convey truths deeper than facts, pointing to new possibilities for collaboration between scientists and artists with relevance to any discipline. Publication of the paperback edition made possible by a Sustaining the Humanities through the American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Traditional Afro-Cuban Concepts in Contemporary Music

Author : ARTURO RODRIGUEZ
Publisher : Mel Bay Publications
ISBN 13 : 1610658884
Total Pages : 152 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (16 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Traditional Afro-Cuban Concepts in Contemporary Music by : ARTURO RODRIGUEZ

Download or read book Traditional Afro-Cuban Concepts in Contemporary Music written by ARTURO RODRIGUEZ and published by Mel Bay Publications. This book was released on 2011-03-11 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This course examines the infusion of traditional Afro-Latin and especially Afro-Cuban concepts into contemporary Western music. Upon completion of this book you will have mastered many new skills that will help you become a more accomplished percussionist and, more importantly, a more complete musician. By exploring the role of percussion in traditional Afro-Cuban music, you will understand the important contribution drums make towards a complete musical piece, and that a drum is not merely a rhythmic placeholder but truly a musical instrument worthy of recognition. While this book focuses primarily on hand percussion, its basic principals are also applied to the drum kit. There is no standard notation in this book; rather, the rhythms are illustrated with easily understood charts based on counting out subdivided beats. Two companion CDs offer audio examples of all major points.

Arará!

Author : Richard H. Thaler
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780982415030
Total Pages : 128 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (15 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Arará! by : Richard H. Thaler

Download or read book Arará! written by Richard H. Thaler and published by . This book was released on 2012-11 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the music notational transcription of Lazaro Galarraga's 'Arara ' CD on the 50-50 Records label. The author has also included a brief history and explanation of the Arara genre and tradition as it is practiced in the Afro-Cuban folkloric culture. In recording his 'Arara ' CD, Lazaro Galarraga drew on a lifetime of playing and singing the songs from this rich tradition. He first learned Arara songs from his grandmother, Petrona when he was five years old. Lazaro credits her and his aunt Gregoria as his first teachers. As a teenager he was an active member in a house of Arara where he often sang at Arara ceremonies. Later he became a member of the Conjunto Folklorico Nacional de Cuba, where he routinely performed Arara songs as part of their repertoire. For a more detailed biography of Lazaro Galarraga, please see the Appendix at the end of this book.

Afro-Cuban Diasporas in the Atlantic World

Author : Solimar Otero
Publisher : University Rochester Press
ISBN 13 : 1580463266
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (84 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Afro-Cuban Diasporas in the Atlantic World by : Solimar Otero

Download or read book Afro-Cuban Diasporas in the Atlantic World written by Solimar Otero and published by University Rochester Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Afro-Cuban Diasporas in the Atlantic World explores how Yoruba and Afro-Cuban communities moved across the Atlantic between the Americas and Africa in successive waves in the nineteenth century. In Havana, Yoruba slaves from Lagos banded together to buy their freedom and sail home to Nigeria. Once in Lagos, this Cuban repatriate community became known as the Aguda. This community built their own neighborhood that celebrated their Afrolatino heritage. For these Yoruba and Afro-Cuban diasporic populations, nostalgic constructions of family and community play the role of narrating and locating a longed-for home. By providing a link between the workings of nostalgia and the construction of home, this volume re-theorizes cultural imaginaries as a source for diasporic community reinvention. Through ethnographic fieldwork and research in folkloristics, Otero reveals that the Aguda identify strongly with their Afro-Cuban roots in contemporary times. Their fluid identity moves from Yoruba to Cuban, and back again, in a manner that illustrates the truly cyclical nature of transnational Atlantic community affiliation. Solimar Otero is Associate Professor of English and a folklorist at Louisiana State University. Her research centers on gender, sexuality, Afro-Caribbean spirituality, and Yoruba traditional religion in folklore, literature and ethnography. Dr. Otero is the recipient of a Ruth Landes Memorial Research Fund grant (2013), a fellowship at the Harvard Divinity School's Women's Studies in Religion Program (2009 to 2010), and a Fulbright award (2001).

Forging Diaspora

Author : Frank Andre Guridy
Publisher : Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN 13 : 0807833614
Total Pages : 289 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (78 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Forging Diaspora by : Frank Andre Guridy

Download or read book Forging Diaspora written by Frank Andre Guridy and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cuba's geographic proximity to the United States and its centrality to U.S. imperial designs following the War of 1898 led to the creation of a unique relationship between Afro-descended populations in the two countries. In Forging Diaspora, Frank

Afro-Cuban Voices

Author : Pedro Pérez Sarduy
Publisher : University Press of Florida
ISBN 13 : 0813065550
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (13 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Afro-Cuban Voices by : Pedro Pérez Sarduy

Download or read book Afro-Cuban Voices written by Pedro Pérez Sarduy and published by University Press of Florida. This book was released on 2020-03-23 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the forewords: "At a time when Cuba is undergoing immense economic and social changes, race becomes a kind of cultural litmus test for the national identity. . . . This anthology illustrates fully that it is possible to be both revolutionary and black in Cuba."—Manning Marable, Columbia University "The authors of Afro-Cuban Voices, also key actors in the new, unfolding dialogue about race in Cuba, make a seminal contribution through a forthright critique of ‘racial blind spots’ in official history and present-day racial discrimination."—James Early, director of cultural studies and communication, Smithsonian Institution From the series editor: "A courageous attempt to deal head-on with the issue of race in Cuba today. . . . Pérez Sarduy and Stubbs [seek to] put a human face on this debate, and do so well. The book will be received with relief by some and with frustration by others. Controversial it will undoubtedly be, since—as with most things Cuban—strong emotions are a given assumption. It will be an admirable beginning for the series and, it is hoped, will spark a much-needed debate in the United States on many aspects of the ‘Cuban question.’ It is about time."—John M. Kirk Based on the vivid firsthand testimony of prominent Afro-Cubans who live in Cuba, this book of interviews looks at ways that race affects daily life on the island. While celebrating their racial and national identity, the collected voices express an urgent need to end the silences and distortions of history in both pre- and postrevolutionary Cuba. The 14 people interviewed—of different generations and from different geographic areas of Cuba—come from the arts, the media, industry, academia, and medicine. They include a doctor who calls for joint U.S.-Cuban studies on high blood pressure and a craftsman who makes the batá drums used in Yoruba worship ceremonies. All responded to four controversial questions: What is it like to be black in Cuba? How has the revolution made a difference? To what extent is that difference true today? What can be done? Exposing the contradictions of both racial stereotyping and cultural assimilation, their eloquent answers make the case that the issue of race in Cuba, no matter how hard to define, will not be ignored. A volume in the series Contemporary Cuba, edited by John M. Kirk

The Latin Bass Book

Author : Chuck Sher
Publisher : "O'Reilly Media, Inc."
ISBN 13 : 1457101386
Total Pages : 466 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (571 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis The Latin Bass Book by : Chuck Sher

Download or read book The Latin Bass Book written by Chuck Sher and published by "O'Reilly Media, Inc.". This book was released on 2011-01-12 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The only comprehensive book ever published on how to play bass in authentic Afro-Cuban, Brazilian, Caribbean and various South American styles. Over 250 pages of exact transcriptions of every note Oscar plays on the 3 accompanying CDs. Endorsed by Down Beat magazine, Latin Beat magazine, Benny Rietveld, etc.

Afro-Cuban Voices

Author : Pedro Pérez Sarduy
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (143 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Afro-Cuban Voices by : Pedro Pérez Sarduy

Download or read book Afro-Cuban Voices written by Pedro Pérez Sarduy and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Cuban Literature in the Age of Black Insurrection

Author : Matthew Pettway
Publisher : Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN 13 : 1496825004
Total Pages : 344 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (968 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Cuban Literature in the Age of Black Insurrection by : Matthew Pettway

Download or read book Cuban Literature in the Age of Black Insurrection written by Matthew Pettway and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2019-12-30 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Juan Francisco Manzano and Gabriel de la Concepción Valdés (Plácido) were perhaps the most important and innovative Cuban writers of African descent during the Spanish colonial era. Both nineteenth-century authors used Catholicism as a symbolic language for African-inspired spirituality. Likewise, Plácido and Manzano subverted the popular imagery of neoclassicism and Romanticism in order to envision black freedom in the tradition of the Haitian Revolution. Plácido and Manzano envisioned emancipation through the lens of African spirituality, a transformative moment in the history of Cuban letters. Matthew Pettway examines how the portrayal of African ideas of spirit and cosmos in otherwise conventional texts recur throughout early Cuban literature and became the basis for Manzano and Plácido’s antislavery philosophy. The portrayal of African-Atlantic religious ideas spurned the elite rationale that literature ought to be a barometer of highbrow cultural progress. Cuban debates about freedom and selfhood were never the exclusive domain of the white Creole elite. Pettway’s emphasis on African-inspired spirituality as a source of knowledge and a means to sacred authority for black Cuban writers deepens our understanding of Manzano and Plácido not as mere imitators but as aesthetic and political pioneers. As Pettway suggests, black Latin American authors did not abandon their African religious heritage to assimilate wholesale to the Catholic Church. By recognizing the wisdom of African ancestors, they procured power in the struggle for black liberation.

Geographies of Cubanidad

Author : Rebecca M. Bodenheimer
Publisher : Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN 13 : 1626746842
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (267 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Book Synopsis Geographies of Cubanidad by : Rebecca M. Bodenheimer

Download or read book Geographies of Cubanidad written by Rebecca M. Bodenheimer and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2015-07-10 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Derived from the nationalist writings of José Martí, the concept of Cubanidad (Cubanness) has always imagined a unified hybrid nation where racial difference is nonexistent and nationality trumps all other axes identities. Scholars have critiqued this celebration of racial mixture, highlighting a gap between the claim of racial harmony and the realities of inequality faced by Afro-Cubans since independence in 1898. In this book, Rebecca M. Bodenheimer argues that it is not only the recognition of racial difference that threatens to divide the nation, but that popular regional sentiment further contests the hegemonic national discourse. Given that the music is a prominent symbol of Cubanidad, musical practices play an important role in constructing regional, local, and national identities. This book suggests that regional identity exerts a significant influence on the aesthetic choices made by Cuban musicians. Through the examination of several genres, Bodenheimer explores the various ways that race and place are entangled in contemporary Cuban music. She argues that racialized notions which circulate about different cities affect both the formation of local identity and musical performance. Thus, the musical practices discussed in the book--including rumba, timba, eastern Cuban folklore, and son--are examples of the intersections between regional identity formation, racialized notions of place, and music-making.