BLACK CAUCA VIBES

These days i have been exploring the Cauca province, south of Cali, looking for signs of Afro Colombian music there. Since Cauca that part of Cauca (the one in between the two mountain range) is more famous for its indigenous population, like the Guambianos and the Nasa, you don't really expect an afrocolombian tradition to arise in this land of green hills and little farms, pineapple crops and small size cattle growing, where the sight of black people actually is a kind of surprise. Why ? because most of them are concentrated in the humid coastal jungle across the cordillera, or in the flat Cauca valley, where they work in the huge sugarcane industry.
A surprise too to see afrocolombians living in houses that resemble more the white paisa's houses of the cafe region, than the wooden constructions one is used to with the rest of the afro colombians.

-as i write these words a couple of huge parrots are flying around screaming. But the nicer the appearance, the uglier the voice, sounds familiar?-

So after a series of socio-spatial and architectural surprises, no wonder we were going to stumble on some MUSICAL SURPRISE, which takes the shape of an afro colombian musical tradition, based on 6/8 rhythms, which main instrument is...the violin ! Probably one of the very few examples of use of violin in african America. The conjunto features a tiple, a guitar, an upright bass (unique features in afro colombian music), a bombo (the one shown in that picture is said to be from early 20th century) and sometimes snare drum, plus maracas and of course voices.



I won't get too much in the details here. so just a few words...Their style is called juga caucana, and it is largely unknown even to the big names of world music like Arwad Esber of Paris' Maison des Cultures du Monde, who confessed it to me. Its origins are very old, but the use of the violin slowly started at the end of the 19th century, mainly because the people there were trying to play cuban music. So it was quite exciting to take a bus, then a motorbike, to go discover that music and area, with its wooden centennial trapiches (the cane's panela's plant, nowadays in concrete) by beautiful rivers. These guys also play bambuco viejo, something known to both white mestizos of andean colombia, where bambuco is an old tradition, and the afro ecuadorians ...Ecuador, to which the Cauca department is linked: listen to the accents, look at the racial composition of the society, the landscape, check out history, the links between the Quito audience and Popayan's role as the then metropolis of southern New Granada...

On top of that, these musicians not only play their music, they also have an oooold tradition of playing Pachanga...Cuban music among the afro pacific people? This would sound strange on the coast, a place isolated from the rest of the world , like Quantic once told me. But Cauca is less disconnected from the rest of the world... which brings me to conclude that topography influences music. Most of them play as families: husband, wife, brother, sister in law, plus the 6 year old playing campana etc....I liked it so much that I went there twice, two week ends in a row, to make contacts, take these pictures, film, listen, dance and go to the river...Their names: Aires de Dominguillo, Palmas, Cañabrava, Renovacion...MAXIMUM RESPECT TO THESE FINE BANDS ! Cañabrava is due to play at the next REPUBLICA CALICUTA, in Cali, june 13th.