Reviewing Reggae from a percussion perspective

I am a fan of Reggae since my early teens (since I was about 11), starting with Peter Tosh, Bob Marley, and soon less-known but real Roots Reggae artists like the Wailing Souls, Burning Spear, the Itals, Ijahman Levi, and Gregory Isaacs.

This means it clearly preceded my later passion for “percussion”, as I would become a percussionist later in life.

TOWARD PERCUSSION

My trajectory toward percussion is in itself interesting, especially in relation to other musical instruments around me. My (Italian) father played accordion in his youth, but had a few harmonicas in the house, my Spanish mother small percussion instruments, including the Spanish castanets. Listening to music, my brothers got interested in guitars, the oldest acoustic Spanish ones, the other bass guitar. They took lessons in time. A friend of the family (son of Italian parents, friends of my parents) played fanatically the drum kit since young, somehow intriguing me.

Seeing a keyboard somewhere, that interested me a bit more, seeming also more practical to me than the stringed guitars. When my brother obtained music software, a MIDI keyboard came in the picture, which I also used. So the first real instrument was a “toy” keyboard and soon after a more serious MIDI keyboard - connected to computer software for music making, which had many interesting, “faux” sampled instruments on it, at least allowing to make music (basic bass and drum, other instruments, piano, trumpet, etcetera). Not “the real thing”, MIDI imitations, but still.. arousing interest to all kinds of instruments. I made compositions with bass, drums, piano, added percussive sounds I liked, or horns, etcetera.

Yet, in a concrete sense, “percussion instruments” were not yet as much on my radar, rather subconsciously and indirectly, even if shaping aspects of songs I liked (scrapers, rattles, hand drums on Reggae songs).

Interesting, therefore, to examine how I became so concretely interested in percussion instruments, after this “keyboard” and MIDI period up to my 30s.

To not make this introduction too long, - and knowing my life of course well - , I resume my trajectory “toward concrete percussion interest” analytically, into some main sources/causes:

1) Liking rhythmical music and dancing to it from young: dancing felt natural to me, as was listening to the drum-based groove, including in Reggae. I’m a dancer, at heart, and my sense of rhythm strong.

2) Making songs with MIDI, having “faux”, sampled percussion instrument sounds also available, using them in songs I made, through computer software. I mentioned this already. Think scrapers, rattles, hand drum sounds on MIDI (conga, bongo, timbales): awakening my interest for real, actual percussion.

3) My interest in learning and reading about Africa and it’s relatively “percussive” culture, including traditional music, and the African Diaspora: African retentions in the Caribbean and Americas. I liked reading also as a child, also about Africa. I studied the African diaspora also professionally a period, and personally. Soon after Reggae I also started to listen to African music, intrigued by sounds of (often percussion) instruments (as part of the whole), then unknown to me.

4) Trips to Cuba I made in the period 2001-2006, having also close personal friends there, especially in Santiago de Cuba, having been to Havana and elsewhere in Cuba too. Like Jamaica, Cuba has a rich musical culture, but one with many acoustic bands, not so much electric, playing live in many places, often in intimate contexts. I sat often close to musicians in Santiago de Cuba, who played percussion instruments, with hand drums like the conga and bongo having the “drum” function, which the drum kit has elsewhere (most Western modern “pop” music, in fact). Cuba however still used mainly “acoustic” hand drums, and other percussion instruments, like cowbells, scrapers, shakers. I enjoyed such live acoustic shows in Cuba, danced to this, and got since then more interested in “concrete”, actual percussion instruments.

Put these causes together, and especially after trips to Cuba, I started to notice the “scraper” or other percussive sounds more in Reggae songs I listened to then before, considering it also part of an Afro-Caribbean connection I now learned about. I began to listen more and more “specifically” to percussion instruments.

Speaking with more musicians, and with interest in black music and Reggae, I got advice to get drumming lessons (the drum kit), seeming to fit my rhythmic interests. The producer of my first officially released single (Rastafari Live On, in 2012), Robert Curiel, was a drummer, as well as studio owner, and hinted at that idea too.

I played with that thought, but found it both expensive and too “robotic” and technical. Too formal perhaps too, taking lessons on a drum kit, step by step, counting

Instead my free mind preferred the “hand drum” vibes I remembered from Cuba, just feeling the groove, intuitively. Rhythmical, yet also giving an extra “sauce” and embellishments to sound, and around the rhythm, often adding swing and polyrhythm to the drum kit. I liked that.

PERCUSSION LESSONS

I therefore bought my first Bongo (Afro-Cuban attached smaller drums), played with it freely on music (mostly Reggae), fitting the groove..

This felt good, and after some years, I decided to take formal lessons for Bongo and Conga with well-known percussionist in the Netherlands (from Curaçao), Vernon Chatlein, in 2014. To give some structure to what I really like.

The - mainly Bongo and Conga drum - lessons were certainly instructive and fruitful, - it gave “structure” - and I learned timing, keeping a steady pattern, and specific Afro-Cuban hand drum patterns (and some Puerto Rican Bomba ones), salsa, son, Rumba, also cowbell patterns, learning about both 4/4 and 6/8 rhythms, the “clave”, different uses of “straight” and “swing” time.

Later. I also took some Djembe and Talking Drum lessons (from an African).

These formal lessons definitely cemented my specific listening to “percussion instruments” within songs from then, in Reggae and other genres: hand drum patterns (more the kete drums in Reggae), scrapers, woodblocks, bells, etcetera.

JAMMING

After these formal percussion lessons in 2014, and some “technical base”, I would play along with jam sessions in various music clubs in Amsterdam (Netherlands, where I live) and around, and it went well, and my rhythmic sense seemed well enough to improvise as well, knowing when to add and when to stop, adapting to other musicians, and different genres. Getting in the groove.

Since I liked jamming with percussion, and it went well, I kept on doing this, up to today. It is definitely a learning experience, a kind of practical schooling about the nuances of rhythm and percussion in a wider musical piece. For years I am jamming now.

More importantly, people liked what I added to those jam sessions with percussion (they told me so, and it showed: it was for changing, international audiences), and this goes against prejudices about “jam sessions” that I note exist: “just ego trips”, I heard some say about those jam sessions in some clubs, as well as “anyone can participate”, as just a social activity. Of course this can be disguised jealousy.

None of these prejudices are true. As in the original Jazz traditions: when playing improvisational, musicians have to respect and listen to each other, give each other space: no hierarchy or superiority. Interestingly, this is according to many a historical response to the “dehumanization” and “infantilization” Black people in the US had to face for centuries. It also explains the much-used word “man” among Jazz “cats”: as opposed to the “boy” White racists in the US South often said to adult Black men.

In practice, jams function the same as bands aiming at a musical piece to please an audience, only more improvised, less strict and formal. People (the audience) enjoy it, beyond the musicians enjoying togetherness (which also is valuable in itself). In fact, it is “purer” as music, more than the composed songs written down to practice and get as tight as possible for some concert or recording. That is less natural.

Neither can “anyone” participate in those jam sessions: you have to have a certain level and feel, and the times when a musician with too little knowledge or skills on stage disturbs the whole quality, this is tactically and diplomatically told, and a song ended sooner, so the musician can be (politely) replaced. Maybe my “haters” hope this, but this never happened to me: I mainly played whole sets, and my additions were appreciated.

My bass-playing brother jammed a few times too, but said that mistakes are more a source for stress for guitarists than for percussion players: a wrong note or chord on bass cannot be occulted, it sounds off-key or “false”, while with percussion you can act like you just started a new pattern, he supposed. This is not entirely untrue, I must admit, but sometimes I just stop a bar or two, and then come in again.

COMPOSING

I further still make my own musical compositions via computer software, - now with more attention to percussion (and having more percussion instruments) than before -, and then I like to “structure” more technically and strict than at free jam sessions, like a band does: tighter, dosed, coordinated, toward a recognizable song, with repeated aspects and tight grooves, of about 3 or 4 minutes long, as the standard goes. This composing and recording for me is, however, is the “end”-point of free creativity, not the starting point: a crucial difference.

Inevitably, I obtained more and more percussion instruments (and some guitars, and wind instruments), and like other percussionists, my house became like a “percussion museum”. For jamming, composing, and recording.

This is where I am at now.

In the remainder of this post I would like to show how my later “specific” attention to percussion instruments in music and songs,- grown organically over time as I just explained – manifests itself when reviewing music, specifically in my favourite genre Reggae.

PERCUSSION-MINDED REVIEWS

I already studied the percussion (somewhat subdued, I found) in Bob Marley songs for another post on this blog, but now I am going to review it on other Reggae albums, ones that I already enjoyed before I “took up” percussion, and started to have more that focus.

I liked those albums and songs on them as whole musical pieces, as of course you have to start when listening music: you have to feel the whole, before checking details.

Yet, now in my life I focus more on percussion, as said, also because of my activities as percussionist. Reviewing songs/albums thus from a percussion perspective. I choose some (a mere, but representative selection) of my favourite albums.

GREGORY ISAACS – SOON FORWARD

This 1979 Reggae album is great, almost from begin to end. The “smooth” lovers title track is best known among Reggae fans, but it contains several good songs (also with “conscious” lyrics), having the involvement of top musicians in Jamaica of the time (Sly & Robbie, among others).

Someone I know said that the tambourine is very important in Reggae. This is not true. It is used at times, but a bit less than in other genres. Not more than in Soul or Pop, for instance. Motown was very “tambourine-heavy”, perhaps an echo of Gospel and Black churches.

The percussion instruments used on Soon Forward show this: a few songs indeed include a tambourine throughout songs, but most not. Recurring are the shakers or maracas (several songs), the Cabasa shaker (the Brazilian shaker with metal beads) – on Down The Line -, woodblocks (several songs, such as the opener), bells (sometimes soft in the mix), and hand drums (kete,a.o.) – e.g. on Slave Market. Mr Brown has the “flex-a-tone” ( a metal, “singing saw” like idiophone), a rattle here and there. The title track has an important role for the guiro scraper.

All these instruments I now play myself, so I notice them. Plus I notice how crucial they are in the whole.

The tambourine is present on about 3 songs on this album, played mostly quite loose, and not as tight “timekeeper” as sometimes in other genres. So hardly “the most important percussion instrument” on this album.

The extensive “hi-hat” use in the Jamaican drumming style (still common in current New Roots from Jamaica), probably in part replaces an eventual “tambourine” need or function. It simply would not add that much, while a shaker sounds more different from the hi-hat, thus enriching the whole sound more than a tambourine would.

I noticed all this already jamming, and making my own songs: you live and learn.

Songs:

(Percussion between bars):

1. Universal Tribulation (shakers, bells)

2. Mr. Brown (flex-a-tone, hand drums)

3 Down The Line (cabasa shaker, woodblock)

4. Lonely Girl (hand drums)

5. Bumping And Boring (woodblock, hand drums)

6. My Relationship (tambourine, woodblock, hand drums)

7. Slave Market (hand drums),

8. Black Liberation Struggle (tambourine)

9. Jah Music (tambourine)

10. Soon Forward (scraper (guiro), shakers, bells/blocks)

WAILING SOULS – FIRE HOUSE ROCK

Another favourite of mine, this great album from 1981. Real Reggae music, from a Roots harmony group, with more good albums. Backed by the great Roots Radics band. It does not even have the tambourine in it, but other percussion instruments, like the cabasa shaker, and the scraper (guiro) recurring on several songs (4 of them even), quite prominent – read: relatively audible or loud – in the mix. The album’s relatively “sparse” sound brings that percussion more to the fore. In fact, the songs would not be the same without them.

Tracklist

A1 Fire House Rock (shaker)

A2 Run Dem Down (scraper)

A3 Oh What A Feeling (triangle(s), shaker(s))

A4 Kingdom Rise Kingdom Fall (scraper, woodblock)

A5 Act Of Affection (shaker)

B1 Busnah (shaker (cabasa))

B2 A Fool Will Fall (triangle/bells, scraper)

B3 Bandits Taking Over (rattle, scraper)

B4 Who Lives It (cabasa shaker)

B5 See Baba Joe (flex-a-tone, cabasa shaker)

BURNING SPEAR – HAIL H.I.M.

Another “classic” album within the Reggae world is Burning Spear’s 1980 album Hail H.I.M, with several great songs, of which Columbus is best known, perhaps.

Some interesting differences regarding percussion, compared to the two discussed above. There is much more use of hand drums added in the mix, partly not very loud, yet “gluing” the rhythm together on several of the album’s songs. Burning Spear (Winston Rodney) being a percussionist and conga player might have something to do with this (playing percussion on this album, along with bass-man Aston "Familyman" Barret), and indeed the drums sounds often more like the (orig. Afro-Cuban) “Conga” (lower, cowskin), than the higher-pitched, cylindrical, smaller “kete” drum, as also used in Rastafari nyabinghi sessions. In the last 4 songs, incl. the “African” songs, the hand drums are a bit more prominent in the mix, both the kete and what sounds like the conga.

The bassline of Jah A Guh Raid – by the way – I translated to percussion, i.e. to a conga drum pattern. I play that one, among others of course, on jam sessions.

Tracklist:

A1 Hail H.I.M. (hand drums)

A2 Columbus (tambourine, hand drums, (cow)bell)

A3 Road Foggy (chimes, triangle, hand drums, rattle/vibraslap)

A4 Follow Marcus Garvey (cabasa shaker, hand drums)

A5 Jah See And Know (tambourine)

B1 African Teacher (woodblock, hand drums)

B2 African Postman (bells, hand drums, wood-/jamblock, cuica (friction drum))

B3 Cry Blood Africa (tambourine, cabasa shaker, hand drums)

B4 Jah A Go Raid (tambourine, hand drums)

RICHIE SPICE – SPICE IN YOUR LIFE

These are somewhat older albums, and perhaps it is good to compare with an example of New Roots (Reggae), an album that I enjoyed very much, namely Richie Spice’s Spice In Your Life from 2004, with “big tunes” (Reggae club hits), Earth A Run Red being the biggest hit, but groovy and catchy songs like Righteous Youths, Black Like A Tar, and Marijuana are also favourites in some Reggae places. Essentially, it is (as more New Roots albums) a collection of recent singles, recorded in different studio’s and (partly) different musicians. Now I am going to look at it from a percussion perspective:

TRACK LIST:

1. Intro

2.Sometimes (Spice In Your Life) (hand drums, shaker (cabasa), rattle/vibraslap)

3. Identity

4. Black Like Tar (woodblock/jamblock, tambourine)

5. Little Elements

6. Crying Out For Love (shaker (cabasa), rattle/vibraslap)

7. Righteous Youths (shaker, hand drums)

8. Run Red Intro 0:21

9.Earth A Run Red (rattle, hand drums, shaker (cabasa), scraper)

10.More Terrible (AKA 911) (none)

11.Folly Living (AKA Blood Again) (hand drums, shakers)

12.Check Yourself (none)

13.Move Dem Out (rattle/vibraslap)

14.Chalwa

15.Marijuana (none)

16.Outta The Blue (hand drums, rattle/vibraslap)

17.Prime Time Girl ((cow)bell, cabasa shaker)

18. Holiday (none)

19.Fake Smile (scraper)

20.Reggae's A Fire (hand drums)

21.Spinning Around (cajón (or guitar case), shaker)

22.Ghetto Girl (none)

What can be concluded regarding this Richie Spice album is that percussion is a bit “modest” – also often soft in the mix – yet present throughout, often “gluing” rhythms together, other times “decorating/embellishing” and “saucing up”, songs, in line with the “seasoning” function of percussion, as some see it. Buried in the mix, yet recognizable. The shaker – especially the “cabasa” is relatively common, adding to its gluing function, while more militant, protest songs – interestingly – have the “sharper” scraper (or guiro) sound, such as the big hit Earth A Run Red, and the song with Chuck Fender.

This is all no coincidence: hand drums recur in more “meditational”, or reflective tunes, and shakers more in “love” songs. This distinction is not clear-cut, but it is an overall tendency, related to the characteristic sounds of the instrument. The art of percussion, is the art of sound.

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

Good to point out that I see these albums I chose to review seem fairly representative of Reggae from the periods (including from other labels as Perry's Black Ark, or Augustus Pablo's Rockers), and the artists (other albums of theirs often having similar percussion instrument choices).

It’s of course not just what percussion instruments are played, but how. Still, overall on these albums (and in my estimation based on what else I know) the shaker – especially the Afro Brazilian Cabasa one – is more commonly used than the most “mainstream” percussion instrument of all: the tambourine. The tambourine recurs here and there, sometimes even pumping – but overall more often the “sharper” shake sound of the Cabasa is heard. I think it is because that Cabasa sound fits the hi-hat pattern more, and the Jamaican drumming style is “hi-hat heavy”. Its sharpness befits in addition rhythmic “closedness” as eventual counter-rhythm.

Hand drums are further common, and the scraper and rattle recur also, as does the friction drum (cuica), with the animal-type sound (known also from Bob Marley’s Could You Be Loved). Also the metal, glissando "flex-a-tone" can be heard

Then, the woodblock/jamblock sharp sound also recur as “driving” many grooves, used well and audibly, often “spicing up” the grooves. The same applies to the cowbell.

On some albums, the percussion instruments fit the lyrics, though never that fixed, as the cabasa can be played “poignant” and short, thus appearing in protest or "conscious” songs as well, and as fitting, only perhaps in a bit more "reflective” songs, as the excellent Busnah on the Wailing Souls album. Other, more militant or “battle” songs on that album have the sharper scraper (called “guiro” in Cuba). Probably no coincidence, but sound-related. On the other hand, the “smooth love” and sexy song “par excellence” – Gregory Isaacs’ Soon Forward, also has a prominent role for the scraper.

The triangle occurs here and there even, such as on Burning Spear’s Road Foggy, and in intro’s of Wailing Souls’ songs.

NEW ROOTS AND PERCUSSION

Percussion remained also enduring enough to remain important in newer post-1990s New Roots Reggae (by Sizzla, Richie Spice, Tarrus Riley, Luciano, Lutan Fyah, Fantan Mojah, a.o.). It is not just an “old-time” outdated thing, but percussion remains being considered crucial to the Jamaican Reggae feel, by Jamaicans themselves. The sound is with modern means now fuller, more instruments, and digital additions/aids, and less sparse than some (somewhat) “emptier” sounding Reggae from earlier decades, making percussions now drown more often in the whole, though in some songs made more prominent to good effect, like on Black Like Tar (the groovy woodblock pattern). Burning Spear has a bit a “full” sound too, yet still has the woodblock audibly crucial in songs like African Teacher, and also in Gregory Isaacs’ great Down The Line: the woodblock helps to make that song unique and appealing rhythmically.

AFRO-AMERICAN CONNECTION?

Well, the guiro scraper remembered me of my Cuban experiences, and live music I heard there, often even “driving” rhythms, which is less the case in Reggae, as already drum-and bass-based, yet still the scraper can be "driving”, as in the Wailing Soul’s Run Dem Down. Elsewhere it adds nice counter-rhythms.

Most hand drums seem the Kete drum from Nyabinghi, higher sounding than the Afro-Cuban conga, which is present here and there, predictably more in Burning Spear songs, who plays conga. The Kete drum may seem more “rootical” and Rasta, yet the Conga, while internationalized, has Afro-Cuban origins, with Congo region presedents. A relatively high percentage of African/Black Cubans have roots in Central Africa, Congo, especially in the music-rich East of Cuba.

The well known double Bongos come from Eastern Cuba, and resembles more the Kete drum in sound, but less deep. Different musical cultures of course, although the “heart beat” pattern of Congo drum traditions can be found in both Cuban and Jamaican music (Nyahbinghi, Reggae), though fitted differently. A part of Africans in Jamaica had roots in the Congo region, though the Ghana and Igbo connections are a bit stronger, also leaving indirect legacies/retentions.

The Cabasa shaker is much used in Reggae (in general) and has Afro-Brazilian origins, providing an interesting link within the African diaspora. Equally interesting are its origins as invention: namely as a modern, more durable “upgrade” of the age-old Shekere shaker of Yoruba culture – and in Afro-Brazilian Yoruba-based music - , but then with metal beads and plastic, replacing the old shekere’s beads and calabash, proven vulnerable. In Cuba that old Shekere is also still used, by the way. The Cabasa modern variant was a Brazilian invention, with eventual international influence (via Samba), also in the West (sold by LP and other big percussion companies). Relatively often used in Reggae, but also in Jazz, Funk, Pop, and non-Brazilian Latin music.

It might well be – though – that Jamaica is the place where the Cabasa shaker is used most in local music, outside of Brazil itself.

The Jamaican (trap) drumming style is “hi-hat heavy”, and requires perhaps a study all by itself. The creative yet steady hi-hat patterns often are engaging (and extra-percussive) enough. The added percussions have naturally to adapt and relate to this. Interestingly, it adds polyrhythm echoes as African retentions, spread over different instruments, drum, percussions, but also bass and rhythm guitar, moving thus between “straight” and “swing” rhythms, combining quite uniquely in Jamaican Reggae: Salsa (about 70% of Cuban origin) is “straight” rhythm (as in Central Africa, Yorubaland), as is traditional music in parts of Africa where most Jamaicans have their roots (like Ghana). On the other hand, Jazz, R&B, and Blues, historically influencing Reggae, are “swing” and “shuffle” based (with roots in Islamic-influenced Senegambian and Guinea/Mande-speaking areas of Africa). It’s that “swing”/shuffle part of reggae that connects more with the “tambourine” (with resonating cymbals, crossing the beat), if one chooses to use it. On some songs, though, the tambourine played counter-patterns, rather than “gluing” all in a shuffle, showing flexible creativity..

Many of the songs on these albums, I enjoyed as a whole from the start, only later in life as percussionist focusing on details. This is natural and human. The percussion, though, offered a kind of extra layer to unpeel in songs, adding even more beauty and “depth” to the music, in later stages.

That is after all another way how some musicians – even veteran Reggae percussionists themselves, like Sticky, Skully, Sky Juice, and Bongo Herman (who plays percussion on Richie Spice’s Earth A Run Red, for instance) – describe the function of percussion (added to trap drums/the drum kit) within Reggae: as a seasoning, extra “spice”, embellishing, but also as adding “depth” to songs, and their rhythms, like some hi-hat patterns, hinting at ancestral Africa’s polyrhythm musical traditions.

The way Jamaican percussionists choose to play – some call it “between the bass and drums” – on and around the main beat, or “filling spaces”, show this polyrhythmic creativity.

My Burro conga pattern and its wider context

When learning to play Afro-Cuban drums like the Bongó (the double, attached smaller drums), and the Conga, I also had some formal lessons from an experienced percussionist, who even had schooling when residing in Cuba, though he was from Curaçao. This was in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and this teacher I had then (back in 2014) was Vernon Chatlein. He became quite well-known in the “percussion world” in the Netherlands, Curaçao, and beyond. More on him here: https://vernonchatlein.com/, or in Dutch https://musicmeeting.nl/nl/artiest/vernon-chatlein.

It would be unnecessary - and perhaps unwise - to share all he taught me, being after all a personal and gradual learning process, internalized and put in practice. Later on I went to jam sessions playing percussion (so after some lessons and self-education) with other people, and composing instrumentals.

That’s the bigger picture, that is not very specific or special. Many people learn to play an instrument, either through formal lessons by teachers or in a school setting (or nowadays online), while others more or less teach themselves, through books or the Internet in modern times.

Drummers (trap/kit) and percussionists play of course no “chord” instruments, so the mathematical “basic knowledge” that implies is not needed. Of course there are examples of great “chord instrument” musicians who could not even read music and did all “by ear” or “feeling”, but nowadays in the Western world some formal theory seems to be the starting point for aspiring instrumentalists.

Also in other cultures, young learners are for a period apprentices with more experienced musicians, as in e.g. Africa, where there are also specific “castes”/social classes of musicians (griots/jeli) within societies, preserving knowledge.

TECHNICAL AND CREATIVE

“Formal” lessons should however be a guiding point, not a “blueprint”, especially if you know yourself to be the “creative type”.

In the music world you roughly have the “technical type”, who do what the rules say, and people like me of the “creative type”. As also in the Western world, males are more active as instrumentalists, so a certain technical/exact sciences bias is there, to some annoyance. The latter especially when they advice more creative musicians, from a “rule” focus, even instruments they do not play.

Be all that as it may, and those fools aside, I took some lessons by others – with a proven record of quality and knowledge - teaching me some useful patterns, and giving me useful advice.

This includes drum/conga patterns. I will specifically focus on one of them, for their wider connotations, beyond the technical.

CABALLO

First I focus on the Caballo, or A Caballo, pattern, which means Horse (or By Horse) in Spanish, and refers to a Conga pattern, said to come from the “Son” musical complex from Eastern Cuba. In time this would feed into what we know as Salsa (largely based on Afro-Cuban music, like Son).

The Tumbao pattern is most known of all Cuban conga patterns, I think, and is also known from Salsa, as are the patterns from the Rumba complex, like Guaguancó (also other parts of Cuba: Havana/Matanzas).

Even people who do not know what the name Tumbao and Guaguancó (a Conga pattern) refer to, might have heard these rhythms in Latin and Salsa music.

The (A) Caballo pattern is a bit less-known, though known in percussion and Latin circles. As the name suggests it imitates the walking – or galloping – sound of a horse, being the joke of it, you might say. This can be fitted well in different rhythms.

I learned this Caballo (horse) pattern, and later tried them out on other music genres, also during live jam sessions in Amsterdam and around. More swing- and shuffle-based genres (Blues, Jazz, etc.) as well, and also on Funk, Rock, or Reggae. Even on Country-like music – not very rich in percussion, usually – it seemed to fit well.

In Cuban music, songs by the Buena Vista Social Club, - like Chan Chan - usually are cited as containing examples of that A Caballo rhythmic pattern, though you have to listen well (listening and “feeling”), and it is often mixed with other older Son/Afro-Cuban patterns.. It certainly has a tradition, and somehow relates to rural areas of eastern Cuba, where horses are known since colonial times.

Horses arrived in the Americas with European colonialism, yet prehistoric antecedents of the wild horses actually originate from present-day America, crossing to Eurasia. We’re talking about around a million years ago, and in America they became extinct, later reintroduced by Spanish and later colonizers.

The modern horse - however - we know today was domesticated around 2200 BC in Eastern Europe, making the modern horse European, albeit with extinct American antecedents.

BURRO?

After having played this “caballo” pattern on conga’s (and other drums, like the bongo), also during jams, both the curious/intellectual as the “creative” sides of me were awakened, apparently. Donkeys are also used in rural areas, in fact more common among poorer rural people than “elite” horses. I have seen donkeys in Cuba, as well. The question then came naturally to me: how would a “donkey pattern” on conga(s) sound? How do donkeys walk?

From this questioning, I came up with the Donkey pattern – played on conga drums - , calling it El Burro (the Donkey in Spanish), as it arose in response to the Cuban “caballo” patterns.

These are wider connotations beyond “technical musical” skills, which run the risk – like all numbers-based “exact” sciences – to become cold and boring, even if (eventually) turning out “groovy” in a musical mix. Rhythm is not just “counting”, but also “soul”, in my view. Also “imagination” and knowledge giving it substance.

THE ANIMAL

I started to wonder how donkeys – also in the horse family, after all – differ from horses, as animals. My mother grew up in rural SW Spain, and told me she had donkey’s, horses, and mules around her (along with goats, sheep, cows, bulls: the Mediterranean picture), but I did not.

I only saw real donkeys in what in the Netherlands are called “kinderboerderijen”, model-farms for children, housing farm animals for educational purposes, aimed at children, mainly: goats, peacocks, sheep, rabbits, geese, pigs, and donkeys.. usually also a bit “rarer” animals, as cows still had an economic use on the Dutch countryside , and were seen more often. Donkeys, however, were held mainly at those kinderboerderijen/model farms, for novelty purposes. I later learned that donkeys – even if held at real farms, stayed inside, as their fur do not protect against rain, and donkeys dislike water.

In the Netherlands, there are quite some manèges - horse riding schools - which kept horses, and I saw people riding horses regularly, sometimes in fields. Donkeys I saw less, though there were a few times.

To make a long story short: I had to search actual donkeys, and further studied through (less-real) online/Internet sources, or nature documentaries. Just to get the sound of them walking, or galloping, which my mother knew from her youth, as other people from rural areas.

As I thus heard about donkeys as common in rural Spain at that time, I began to question if maybe they were more common in Spain – and wider Mediterranean areas – than in a Northern European country like the Netherlands.

ORIGIN AND CHARACTERISTICS

Further study about the origins and current spread of donkeys led to interesting information, of some things I did not know. The origin of the donkeys is traced to Eastern Africa (Somalia, Ethiopia, Nubia), in drier climates. They were first – interestingly – domesticated in Nubia, around what is now Sudan and around. So originally African. This domestication by pastoral people in Eastern Africa (following those of oxen, etc.) took already place around 7000 BC, so much earlier than the mentioned one of horses in Europe.

The drier and less hospitable (desert-like, arid) climate must have shaped the genetic makeup of the donkey: indeed it is known as resilient, and as “stubborn”, even in popular sayings. Its characteristics were shaped by surviving in deserts, unlike the horses (from wetter grasslands), hence its resilience, endurance, eating patterns, but also e.g. bigger, rotating ears – and good hearing - , loud noises (yee-haw), and a more independent nature, even after domestication. They are quite strong (relative to body weight, stronger than horses), and are known for good memories, e.g. in remembering long routes exactly. They are also known as “prudent”, avoiding dangers calmly.

Other interesting differences with horses and other equines I learned about in some interesting documentaries I saw. Donkeys tend to be “hydrophobic” (eschewing water), due to their desert origins, see mostly canides (dogs, wolves) as main enemies, and also, as said in a documentary, “are the only equines that never flea from danger”. They are thus much less fearful than e.g. horses, and also when encountering problems or dangers, stay calmer than other animals – or even humans. Donkeys always keep their cool. Kind of like the Shaft (“..the ‘cat’ who won’t cop out when there’s danger all about”, as sung in the Shaft theme song), of the equines.

CULTURAL IMAGE

In Western history, some stereotypes of donkeys as somehow “dumb”, “nitwits” or slow, arose, as well as insults based on this.

In Greek culture and myths (around their god Apollo) this image of “dumb” or “stupid” was already there. In one story, Midas (the expression Midas Touch come from this Greek myth), a king who wished he could turn everything he wanted in gold, had his ears turned into those of a donkey, as punishment for judging music wrongly. He favoured someone he knew over Apollo’s, who was known as vane but played good. Those Greek myths are sometimes strange, with more hidden symbolism and morality. A difference with the Bible stories, where the moral intent and symbols tend to be clearer. Punished with donkey ears, while donkeys actually have exquisite hearing (better than other animals, and better than humans).. Ironic…

William Shakespeare, the famous British writer, was in fact very negative about the donkeys, deeming them stupid, and inventing in his works even “new” words for the English dictionary, as “donkey insults” (like jackass, and all words with “jack” or “ass”, “you know jackshit” means you don’t know anything, etc.). This became normalized within Britain and the English language. This in time also in sharp contrast to the almost “adored” status of the other equine, horses, in British culture.

The work of Shakespeare’s contemporary (a bit earlier) counterpart in Spain, who wrote Don Quijote, Miguel de Cervantes, was more positive. The protagonist, the idealist knight Don Quijote rode a horse he named Rosinante -, but his steady helper (and "sidekick" avant-la-lettre) was the more down-to-earth Sancho Panza, who in turn rode a donkey (then common in Spain) alongside him. This donkey is in the Don Quijote novel described quite affectionately, as a loyal companion, on their journeys in this famous story.

Yet, after Ancient Greece, Rome, and England, also in Spain, and other parts of Europe (Germany, Netherlands, France) donkeys were described as dumb, used as insults for humans considered unintelligent or stupid/dumb-witted. The Spanish “rumba flamenco” pop hit Borriquito (1972) – even an international hit – used it as such, the lyrics going: “you are just a stupid little donkey (also “borrico” in Spanish), I know more than you”, as a kind of jokingly out-bragging. I heard the song through my family contexts. Singer Peret comes from a Catalonia-based Roma family.

I personally liked the other 1970s international Spanish flamenco pop hit I heard likewise through Spanish family, “Poromopompero” (Manolo Escobar), better, but that’s my taste. Borriquito was a very simple song, but sometimes those big international hits don’t have much substance, lyrically or musically, as we all know, haha, just a catchy, careless flow, sometimes.

In other continents, the donkey does not always have a better image, and their dumb or stupid image unfortunately also recurs in parts of Asia and Africa, or as “simple” and “slow”, “A donkey that goes to Mecca is still a donkey”, is an unflattering saying in the Islamic world, while in some languages of Ethiopia (with quite some donkeys still) the stereotype in sayings is not so much about the donkey’s stupidity, as more about coarse, simple manners, and irresponsibility. At least there are some positive sayings in some Ethiopian languages (Amhara, Oromo) referring to donkeys too, besides negative ones. Some include also the hyena: the natural enemy of the donkey in African contexts. This explains that “canides” outside of Africa (dogs, wolves) became also the biggest enemies of donkeys. Hyenas after all belong to the canide family too.

In Jamaica, donkeys were long commonly used by peasants and small farmers, horses being considered for richer or white (British) people, as a Jamaican friend of mine told me from his youth. Despite the same (British-inherited?) “dumb image” of donkeys, they are more seen in practical terms, as needed - or even respected - part of country life.

The same applies in rural Cuba, where a “fun” Son song (El Burro De La Loma) even describes how the Burro (donkey) parties and dances along with the music. US singer (R&B) Chuck Berry also has such a theme (donkey dancing to its rider’s music) on the 1961 song The Man and the Donkey.

In old and new Jamaican Reggae and Dancehall, in Cuban Son, but also in music from Colombia or Mexico, or Dominican bachata, donkeys mostly appear in lyrics as part of rural stories, not always negatively.

In some, more lewd Reggae or Dancehall songs from Jamaica the “donkey rod” refers to a (supposed) “well hung” (big penissed) man, for that reason preferred by women. Like horses, donkeys are known for that (relative big penis).

Despite these widespread and international, often negative stereotypes of stupidity, the donkey’s remarkable natural qualities were used by men after domestication, for beasts of burden or other heavy work in agricultural and other areas (carrying goods – pack animals - , cultivation, plowing, sheep herding, even hiking nowadays). Humans make use of their endurance, strength, lack of fear, and good memories for terrains. Also their way of walking (crossing legs while walking) is quite unique, allowing passing through narrower spaces. In the same vein, donkeys move better through uneven, mountainous areas than horses. The “stupid” image is thus not even based in truth.

Despite this domestication, the donkeys remained more independent than horses. It was said in a documentary that they can be “educated, but not trained” – unlike other animals (dogs, horses), reminding of “cat-like” features. One Spanish saying therefore warns that a donkey should be in front, else it escapes. Like in Ethiopia, Spanish sayings about donkeys can be good, bad, and neutral.

All these “supposed” traits sound - in fact - like cool characteristics!

NUMBERS WORLDWIDE

According to recent sources, there are a total of about 45 million donkeys at present worldwide. Less than I thought, actually.

Recent numbers show that some African countries (Ethiopia, followed by Sudan) have relatively most donkeys, while also e.g. Pakistan, Mexico, and now also China (many imported recently), have relatively many. Ethiopia has about 19 % of the whole global donkey population.

In Europe, Portugal, Greece, and Spain have relatively most, but there has strongly diminished over time (industrialization, agricultural modernization). Sources suggest that around the Spanish Civil War (1936) there were still around a million (!) donkeys in Spain alone, with even distinct subspecies. Modernization and urbanization since then diminished this strongly to now only about 30.000, some sources state. Still more than in more northern parts of Europe, but a strong decrease, nonetheless, and now endangered in parts of Spain. That there were a lot in Spain, explains why my mother encountered them often in rural Spain in her youth. I hardly (very rarely) saw them growing up in (and travelling through) the Netherlands, from the 1970s to now. Recent numbers estimate the total number of donkeys in the Netherlands (as of 2023) at around 9000 (to compare: horses about 450.000!).

While not particularly known as having “vegetarian” cultures, in both Spain and Portugal, donkeys were seldom eaten, seeming to be eschewed there for meat, unlike other beasts of burden like goats. In countries like Ethiopia and Somalia in Africa, this (eating donkey or horse) is even more a taboo. In other parts of the world, though, like China, donkey flesh is eaten, and in Italy too. So differing even within continents.

This eating of donkey flesh and supposed medical benefits of hides in some regions (as China) diminished the donkey numbers too, besides urbanization. Especially, the high demand for donkey hides for the popular Chinese e-jiao “medical” products, led sadly many donkeys to the slaughter for commercial gain in Africa (sent to China) and later in India (also for the Chinese market), thereby also depriving poor rural people of their working aid. Recently, though, most African countries banned this donkey hide export to China.

In the Americas, predictably, donkeys came first with Spanish colonizers, it is said already on Columbus’ second voyage, and became over time more common in parts of Latin America and the Caribbean (Mexico, Colombia, but also islands like Cuba and Jamaica).

SENSE

So besides for having special and cool characteristics as animal – and I think an unjust image of dumbness -, my conga pattern imitating the donkey trot/galloping, in response to the Afro-Cuban caballo/horse pattern, also makes sense historically. Plus – as an African animal -, also with a connection to Africa, as much of Caribbean music. The pattern thus makes symbolic sense.

A different animal (even if of the equine family), the donkey walks and gallops different from the horse, so the pattern I invented is also different: the Burro pattern on congas “keeps its cool”, is prudent yet steady, fearless, adjusts to “rougher” environments, and works dedicated/loyally, yet independent. Indeed like the animal.

The pattern I created, emphasizes more the lower (“hembra”) drum, with only “one” higher “slap” on the higher (“macho”) drum – to compare: the A Caballo/horse pattern has two high slap sounds -, and the Burro further has in-between triple soft/ghost notes. Prudent and “cooler”, this Burro pattern, than the Caballo one, like the donkey is also known as "humbler" than horses. Ha!

Herein this video I explain/describe my Burro conga pattern in more detail, also in relation to the existing Cuban Caballo pattern:

My “burro” conga/percussion pattern - like the overall flexible donkey - also can be fitted – I found out - in many grooves and music genres. Straight-rhythm and/or swing-based. I only have not tried it out so much on Country: I listen and play less on Country, but the few times I did, I chose the Caballo/Horse pattern: a Cuban feel, while referring to cowboy life, haha. That while there exist Country songs about donkeys (Little Gray Donkey by Johnny Cash, a Christian song), but more about horses.

Besides that, I could fit the Burro pattern rhythmically on very different music genres, with some skilful adaptations, which is I think also nice for other conga or percussion players to try out (Blues, Rock, Reggae, Funk, Pop, Latin, you name it). Perhaps even Ethiopian music.. Fun – and appropriate - to start with songs with “donkey” in the title, like some already mentioned in this post, from different genres (search further on Youtube: this post has just some examples). Drummer Bernard "Pretty" Purdie’s ‘Funky Donkey’ I can e.g. recommend: groovy to play it on! Originally from 1968, this groove is said to inspire also the Jamaican Reggae riddim Death In The Arena..

Cuban and Dominican music: differences and similarities

The Dominican Republic consists of a large eastern part of the island of Hispaniola, in the Caribbean. A former Spanish colony, it has predictable similarities with a country like Cuba, which I personally have visited repeatedly, and studied the culture of. The Dominican Republic overall has a mixed African-European population – like Cuba - , as a result of African slavery, of course, but the economic intensity of plantation slavery was stronger (and longer) in Cuba. On the other hand, European (especially Spanish) added migration was during and after slavery stronger to Cuba, changing also the demographics.

ETHNIC BACKGROUNDS

Another difference is the more retained – or less diluted - Amerindian, indigenous Taíno “blood” within the Dominican Republic, more rarely noticeable (safe some rural areas) within the present Cuban population, mostly ranging from – simplifyingly said – Southern European to dark-skinned Africans, and all in between.

In a very general sense, this also applies to the Dominican Republic. This also has cultural connotations, and also musical ones. As a percussionist, and being interested in Caribbean music, I am very interested in that. This is also the case, because I studied Afro-Cuban music quite a lot, in a detailed manner for my percussion playing and songs. Dominican music, however, I studied less, for some reason. I have been several times to Cuba, but never to the Dominican Republic.

I heard Dominican genres Bachata and Merengue here and there, liked some songs, but never got the same “bug” as with Cuban music, notably Son, Changui, and Rumba. That could relate to the fact that I was simply already focusing on Cuba, so could contextualize Cuban music better, with less effort than having to delve in another culture and context (the Dominican one, in this case).

In some instances, I studied some Dominican rhythms for musical and percussive variation. It did not went much further than that, however. I kept focusing more on Cuba.

LIBRARY

Having worked in/for a scholarly library with many anthropological and socio-political works about wider Caribbean history and culture, I nonetheless acquired quite some knowledge about the Dominican Republic’s history, but more so more recent history, under dictator Trujillo (1930-1961), and later political developments. Politics got overall more attention in those scholarly historical works than popular culture (though there were some interesting works about culture too), which perhaps showed an elitist bias, I guess. There was also much attention in those works to cultural policies by the ruling classes, that can be characterized as pro-white/-European, and against the African heritage. The upper class (predictably mostly more of European descent than Amerindian or African) manifested in that sense a racist, pro-European, or Spanish, culture for the country, downplaying the African heritage at most to the merely folkloric, and even that at times reluctantly.

Also dictator Trujillo, ruling from 1930 until 1961 (partly as force behind puppet presidents), and himself a light Mulatto, promoted such policies during his strict, repressive and violent regime, albeit with some contradictions. The historical animosity with the neighboring, more African/”Blacker”, Haitians was in propaganda for instance stimulated.

Among the common population of the Dominican Republic this found some resonance, though not so much. Unlike what I noticed in parts of Northwestern Europe, Latin American people do not sense so much identification with their political leaders and their policies: there was and is much more distance with the political class, to be explained by historically lacking democracy and large social inequalities.

Studies also showed that despite that Trujillo or other leading Dominican political leaders promoted animosity to Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic, in many places there was Dominican-Haitian cooperation, and even family ties. The somewhat pro-Spanish biased “Latino” identity the Dominicans seemed to favour over a “Black” or “African” one – or even instead of an appropriate Mulatto one – was not so widespread among all Dominicans, many simply recognizing African contributions as well, calling themselves “mixed”, with some African contributions.

Such African contributions are found in music, including in the well-known Merengue genre, having spread internationally over time to later also compete with Cuban-based Salsa in “Latin music” circles, as well as Bachata music, developing later in the Dominican Republic (on Eastern Cuban models).

Of both Merengue and Bachata it is clear – and recognized – that it somehow reflects the different legacies of Dominican culture: the Spanish one, the African one, and the indigenous, Amerindian one, showing in instrumentation. Guitar/string instruments – and song types – reflect the Spanish heritage, the drums and rhythmic patterns (e.g. common syncopation) the African heritage, whereas the scraper and shaker instruments (Guira) are connected to the indigenous heritage. In itself an interesting “triracial” mix, not dissimilar to what recent DNA studied showed about most inhabitants of the Dominican Republic, with European, African, but also indigenous DNA (more than previously assumed).

MUSICAL DIFFERENCES

I wonder then, though, as to a degree comparable “mixtures” (Spanish-African, Amerindian instruments) are also found in Afro-Cuban music genres – with different accents -, what are the differences between the best-known Dominican genres of today, being Bachata and Merengue, with Cuban genres like (mostly) Salsa, Son, Rumba, etcetera?

The remainder of this post is about that. How different are the music genres between these different parts of the “Spanish Caribbean”, after all, not so far away from each other geographically? What explains those differences? And also, why those differences?

Where there perhaps also interactions in historical epochs, between Cuba and the Dominican Republic?

Due to my personally acquired knowledge and experience by now, my starting point and base is Afro-Cuban music, comparing Merengue, Bachata, and other Dominican genres to that what I happen to know better the history and characteristics of: Cuban music.

MERENGUE

Merengue is faster than Salsa or (other) Cuban music. I noticed that soon enough. The dance to it is also faster (and simpler). Other musical differences are that Merengue tends to be in counted in 2/4 beat/time signature (Cuban Son/Salsa 4/4, Rumba often 6/8), shared with Brazilian Samba (also 2/4). The common instruments used in traditional Merengue include the typically Dominican double-sided Tambora drum, the Guira metal scraper, and the Accordion, that at one point replaced string instruments (since the 1880s).. The Accordion play repeated syncopated patterns, rendering often a danceable, lively groove. The Guira metal scraper bears similarities to the East Cuban Guaya scraper (in Son Changui, for instance), but plays faster patterns

The Accordion is by contrast not really used in Cuban music, neither is that (Dominican) Tambora drum type found much in Cuban music (mostly open-bottom drums). Rhythmically, Merengue has similar “swaying” characteristics as found in neighboring Haiti’s music (only faster), perhaps shaped as such originally (some Haitian influence), but denied with the later mentioned Dominican-Haitian tensions that arose. There is also a Haitian genre named Méringue, which shares similarities not just in name with Dominican Merengue (see my post about Haitian music), and has not coincidentally its origins in the same 19th-c. period (around 1850).

Later, more modern Merengue versions (such as “de orquesta”, orchestra-types) added more instruments, including wind instruments (notably the saxophone), other percussion (conga’s a.o.), often with influences from other parts of the region (including Cuba), and string instruments.

Dictator Trujillo actually promoted Merengue music as national music, related to his own humble origins (like Merengue), while at the same time contradicting his anti-African heritage stances regarding other aspects of Dominican culture. He used Merengue for his propaganda, and connection to the populace.

BACHATA

Bachata is a newer genre, of more recent origin (becoming known in the Early 1960s), like Merengue hailing from Northern parts of the Dominican Republic. It is less “local” in that it is influenced from the start by Cuban Bolero and Son, with an own touch over time, but maintaining a string-instrument base, unlike Merengue. From Cuban models, it developed into an own genre over time in the Dominican Republic, including Merengue influences, and a shift to steel and electric guitars, resulting in prominent guitar patterns, mixed with varied percussion, mostly including the (originally Cuban!) Bongos, as small, high-pitched hand drums. The syncopated, rhythmic interaction between the strings and bongo (and other percussion) still reflect its origins in Cuban Bolero and Son, albeit adapted.

One difference with the Cuban models are faster, own Bongo rolls and also “fuller” and electric guitar patterns, less “spacious” than in Cuban Son. It tends to be overall faster in tempo to Cuban Son or bolero.

PALO

Palo is a semi-religious, more sacred folk music genre in the Dominican Republic with more direct African retentions, centered on (Catholic) saints or ancestors and combined drums and call-and-response vocals of African origins. The drums are three open-bottom drums as in the Congo tradition, with the low-pitched drum providing steady beats, and the other drums variations. This has superficial similarities with Afro-Cuban Rumba types, while “heart-beat” like drum base rhythms reflect a Congo heritage, also found elsewhere in the African diapora in the Americas (Haiti, Jamaica, Colombia).

The three drums combine with different instruments in different parts of the country, with the Guira scraper recurring, but in some regions of the Dominican Republic also with e.g. tambourines.

Also a difference with Cuba, where bells are used more often, as well more shaker (maraca) types. It lacks a bit that “clave” (key beats) base of Cuban music, but further has similarities. Mainly of Congo origin, the similarities could be explained by the strong Congo influence of much Afro-Cuban music, including on Son, and (partly) on Rumba, and similar genres – also named Palo – in especially Eastern Cuba. Cuban Palo uses some other patterns and instruments, though, than its Dominican namesake.

EXPLAINING THE DIFFERENCES

What I find interesting in this case, is how these differences – and similarities - between the music genres of two “Spanish Caribbean” nations, with both (in general) a mixed Spanish-African population, geographically close to each other – Cuba and the Dominican Republic – can be explained. This explanation is mostly historically, of course.

SLAVERY

More intense and longer-lasting slavery of Africans in Cuba explains some differences. The historical conflicts of the Dominican Republic with neighbouring Haiti also some. After the Haitian Revolution (up to 1804), - and in the 1820s - Haiti occupied the bordering Dominican Republic for a period, even making some Dominican leaders prefer continued Spanish colonial rule, while border disputes were also long problematic. The animosity between more European-oriented Dominicans, and more African Haitians continued for long, including racist aspects in the Dominican Republic.

This went so far that dictator Rafael Trujillo (from 1930 to 1961) hid his part-Haitian ancestry (on his mother’s side) as part of his regime’s propaganda, inventing instead a vague personal Spanish nobility origin from colonial times, and lightening his mulatto skin tone.

POPULAR LEVELS

These kinds of sentiments were mostly political, and to a lesser degree “popular”, as Afro-Dominican culture was still kept alive, albeit sometimes diluted or denied.

This was somehow different in Cuba, where “Africanness” as cultural identity was by some parts of the population proudly asserted, even though it was deemed certainly problematic by elite, pro-European circles, and seen as vulgar, in several historical epochs, even postcolonial ones, It proved, however, impossible to deny or ignore, especially as music genres like Son (from “blacker” Eastern Cuba) and Afro-Cuban Rumba gained wider popularity also in Havana.

Interestingly, in both Cuba and the Dominican Republic, “white political elite” dogmas and preferences were largely ignored, or circumvented, on the popular levels, continuing the incorporation and even celebration of African cultural retentions.

In the case of Cuba, with more slave imports, up to a later time period (even up to the 1860s), there were more maintained sensed African identities among Afro-Cubans, and more direct African cultural retentions, even of a specific ethnic nature or geographical origin (Yoruba, Congo, Calabar/Efik), including spiritual and musical aspects.

This was simply too hard to repress, although in certain epochs it had to be hidden more in Cuba. Even during Castro’s communism – frowning on Afro-Cuban “religion”, like Santería (mostly Yoruba) or Palo Mayombe (mostly Congo), the spiritual rituals continued underground.

Such African identities were more fluid and mixed – or downplayed - in the case of Afro-Dominicans, though surviving in part in Palo music (mixed with Catholicism) and subtly in musical elements of Merengue and Bachata).

It resulted – however – in less types of hand drums and other African percussion in the Dominican Republic, when compared to Cuba, though Congo-type drums are present in Palo music,. Bachata, however, adopted the Afro-Cuban Bongó. The indigenous Amerindians left their mark in both Cuban and Dominican music, mostly in instruments like the scrapers (Guiro/guira, Guaya), and in some shakers.

AFRICAN ORIGINS

While close to each other, and despite the Spanish colonial connection, some musical differences thus arose in the local contexts. The normative Accordion use in Merengue relate to German traders and travelers to the Dominican Republic, related to the tobacco trade, bringing the (after all German-invented) instrument. This did not seem to have occurred in Cuba, where the accordion remained an oddity in its folk music, if present at all. It never replaced string or other “chording”/melodic instruments in Cuba, maintaining its tres or other guitar use.

The characteristics of the Accordion made Dominican Merengue more “swaying” than Cuban “straighter” rhythms, but also the early Haitian connection of Merengue, however denied by authorities. The irony of neighboring enemies, that nonetheless share more than with others.

The bells, and clave-patterns might relate to the Yoruba influence in Cuba, as well as some other instrument uses (like the Shekere bead shaker). Africans from various nations ended up in the Dominican Republic. Christopher Columbus himself brought some from the Senegambia area around 1500 (one of the first African slave transport to the Americas), while later Congo, Dahomey/Ewe (like in Haiti), and even Ghana, became sources for slaves to the Dominican Republic.

Yoruba were less represented in the Dominican Republic, as they were enslaved and sold in a later stage in what is now Nigeria, related to the “jihad” (religious war) attacks of the Islamic Hausa invading from north of Yorubaland, enabling their capture and sale to Europeans (Portuguese, Spanish) up to the 1840s. Britain by then has (formally) abolished the slave trade, but it continued to Brazil and Spanish colonies (and illegally by Britons), but the Dominican Republic had abolished slavery already by 1822 (under Haitian influence), Cuba only as late as the 1880s, still importing slaves (also illegally) up to the 1860s.

Quite some Congo/Central African/Bantu slaves ended up in Cuba (estimated at 40% of them), which does provide a cultural link with Afro-Dominicans, though with some differences. Scholars assert that Bantu-speaking slaves in the Dominican Republic, often came from other ethnic groups in the wider Congo-Angola region than those in Cuba, besides sometimes from the same region. Still shared similarities as a cultural region, but with regional differences. Just like you have, e.g., within countries like Spain or Italy.

EUROPEANS

Regarding the Spanish, or European side, there were similarities in migration between Cuba and the Dominican Republic, such as a shared input of Canary islanders (even on the Caribbean Spanish language accent), and further Andalusian/South Spanish and Catalan influences. The Catalonian influence became stronger with the slavery peak in Cuba after 1820, as many slave owners and investors in plantations came from more wealthy and industrialized Catalonia, and other northern Spaniards (like the Basque slave-owning family Zulueta). The famous Bacardi family (from the rum) was also Catalan in origin, and were also owners of many African slaves.

Yet, sources state that among the earlier Spanish (“White”) settlers in the Dominican Republic, there were also relatively many Catalans, alongside Canarians, and others. This still reflects in Catalan surnames in present-day Dominican Republic (Bosch, Balaguer).

The South Spanish influence was still there, as what we know as the early Spanish guitar was in fact Andalusian in origin. Some Cuban music genres (like Punta) show Andalusian and Flamenco elements, while the recurring string instruments and guitar patterns show this South Spanish influence in Cuba (soon mixed with African ones), perhaps stronger than in the Dominican Republic, where guitars nonetheless were known too.

In fact, a French influence (via Haiti) might have had some effect on the European side of the mixed music in the Dominican Republic.

POLITICS

A final influence relate to political differences. Trujillo supported Merengue music for his propaganda, as pre-Castro leaders sometimes supported (selectively) Afro-Cuban aspects, despite a stronger pro-European/Spanish bias. Fidel Castro’s communism in name supported Afro-Cuban culture, yet its policies and dogmas sometimes limited it. The Marxist and Communist formal atheism was at first strongly adhered to under Castro, working also against popular Afro-Cuban faiths and folk religions like Santería, obliging practitioners even to secrecy in periods.

While music education was stimulated and is conveniently state-paid – supporting musicianship – under Cuban communism, the general cultural focus was more European/Western. This was noted also by Carlos Moore, who became a Cuban refugee and opponent of Castro, after first sympathizing and working some time for Fidel Castro. Moore - in exile - critiqued Castro’s dictatorial tendencies, but also his cultural bias and close-mindedness, restricted to Castro’s own “White”, Hispanic ethnicity. Castro was not in touch with Afro-Cuban culture, Moore argued, forming after all a substantial part of Cuban society: a majority (estimated at 80%) is at least partly of African descent, with over 25% of Cuba even mainly of African descent. Add to this around 50% of Cubans being mixed-raced.

Trujillo was unlike “Hispanic White” Fidel Castro (who was of Galician Spanish and Canarian descent), rather a light Mulatto, with some African blood, but was in denial about it, resulting in the psychological complexities and contradictions common to self-hatred and troubled identity issues. What Black Americans dubbed as the “Uncle Tom” effect. Later presidents – from 1961 to now - (often mostly White) continued the pro-European, anti-Haitian cultural focus of Dominican politics.

Like in Cuba, though, the popular culture could not be shaped or altered so easily by politicians, maintaining a strength by itself among common folk, showing in subtle yet noticeable African retentions in main Dominican genres as Merengue and Bachata (syncopation, percussion, call-and-response), and even more direct African retentions in Congo-derived Palo music in the Dominican Republic.

More recent allowance of social commentary lyrics in Merengue (also by famous Juan Luis Guerra) and Bachata (beyond romantic or party themes) affirm these genres all the more as truly nonelite and popular.

INTRA-CARIBBEAN

And yes, there were relations between the Dominican Republic and Cuba, historically (through Cuban Son and Bolero) by shaping the Bachata genre, and also on Afro-Cuban influences on later Merengue styles (“de orquesta”).

The other way around less, confirming Cuba’s special place as musical hotbed in Latin America, not unlike Jamaica for the rest of the Anglophone Caribbean. Dominican radio stations – on the other hand - reach Eastern Cuba (around Santiago de Cuba, Son’s heartland), making Bachata and Merengue songs quite popular there as well, as varying foreign influence. There are by now also Cuban artists making Bachata, like Kirenia, Michel Felix, Meyita, and Verónica Velázquez, found on a compilation “Bachata from Cuba” to be found online.

Funny how the Domincan touches that later adapted Cuban Son and Bolero (electric steel guitar, faster bongo rolls, a.o.) to form Dominican Bachata, actually came back to Cuba as well. Not the “purist” approach, let’s say, but open and creative, accepting “what they did with it”. Something comparable happened with what in New York became known as Salsa in the 1980s, but was largely Cuban Son-based.

Merengue is of course known in present-day Cuba, but as Dominican and foreign genre, and sometimes appreciated or played on the radio or in clubs (as international, foreign “Latin” hits). Yet it seemed less “absorbed” by Cuban musical artists, as few Merengue artists as such in Cuba are known (some experiment with it).

There is a traditional, percussive Haitian Merengue known with that name in Eastern Cuba, due to historical Haitian influence, but this derived from Haitian Méringue. Interestingly, yet not surprisingly, it has some rhythmic, “swaying” similarities even with modern Dominican Merengue, showing original Haitian-Dominican connections on Hispaniola, shaping Merengue.

Maracas, Cuba, and Fernando Ortiz

It almost is like the proverbial “elephant in the room”, in my case: the Maracas. A well-known, round-like with handle, shaker instrument known from Cuban and “Latin” musical cultures mostly, although not always under that name.

I am a percussionist, and wrote quite a lot about percussion instruments on my (this) blog. Instruments I use a lot, and even those a bit less (my article about tambourines, for instance). Maybe in one sense the “Maracas” seemed too cliché, too common an instrument, to warrant extra attention, but that is not even true.

I find the Maracas as used in e.g. Cuban music in fact interesting. It might not seem a “spectacular” or “rough” instrument, rather “mellow” and “soft”, one might say, but it is nice and even more influential than some would imagine. Maracas also have a long history, that is global.

FERNANDO ORTIZ

I recently read a small book by Cuban anthropologist Fernando Ortiz (1881-1969), who studied Afro-Cuban life and culture, and had influence even in wider Caribbean studies. There is also an institute in Cuba named after him (which I visited).

Ortiz was a white Cuban (of primarily Spanish descent) with a sincere interest in Afro-Cuban culture. It became sincere, but started out wrong. Early in his career more politically involved, he started studying criminal life among some Black Cubans, even employing some nonsensical, not to say morally dubious theories, such as from the rightly discarded “phrenology” idea: that criminal tendencies would show in the physical traits of people (outside, or the brain). That he focused on black Cubans at first, made it even more dubious. Also, the link between phrenology and now also discarded eugenics is historically tainted, though the latter “eugenic” foolishness persisted even beyond Nazism, up to the 1970s in parts of the US and Europe (the father of the influential billionaire Bill Gates was involved in it).

These Afro-Cuban “underground” people Ortiz “studied”, were mostly members from the secret society Abakuá (largely of Efik-Ibibio, Calabar/Cameroun/Nigeria origin) that had cultural organizations, regarded though – today we would say “framed” – also as criminal havens. Largely unjustly criminalized, but the government wanted more control (even before communism).

Ortiz however proved, over time, that he had an open mind, and was not a hardcore racist. He even changed - also by his own admittance - starting to focus on the beauty and variety of Afro-Cuban expressions: its varied African origins, and contributions to Cuban culture and music. Maybe it’s even a kind of “falling in love”, in some sense. There’s some “literary” beauty in this change of Ortiz, from Saul to Paul.., haha

Henceforth this became his focus, as he also became more anti-racist by the 1940s. He wrote some larger studies about Afro-Cuban and Cuban culture, with some anthropological influence even beyond “Cuban studies” - such as his coining of the term “transculturation” – but also some smaller works about aspects of Afro-Cuban culture.

MARACAS BOOK

As part of his series about typical Afro Cuban musical instruments, Ortiz also wrote about Maracas (shakers), in the 1950s. The book ‘Las Maracas’ in the series ‘Los instrumentos de la musica afrocubana” (the instruments of Afro-Cuban music), by Fernando Ortiz..

This I read recently, and I will focus on it, as fitting the theme I chose. It further also served me, to find out what I really know about shakers or Maracas.

Ortiz’s book seemed to have appeared only in Spanish (a translation is a good idea), but luckily I can read that language.

I do not know much about the academic culture in Cuba or the Spanish-speaking world of then, but this small book is more a “flux de bouche” as they say in French, or “ramble” in English. With little structure, paragraphs, no blank lines/extra space, or heads..

Fortunately, Ortiz writes quite attractively and engagingly, though with a tendency to “comma writing” as I call it: long sentences with “side paths”. I have that tendency too, so won’t criticize it too much, haha.

In the book, anyway, he shows his open mind and wide interest. He also shows his broad knowledge about – or study of - cultures even outside Cuba, as a true anthropologist.

One thing I asked myself about Maracas, were their origins. Of course, I saw Maracas being played often by Cuban musical groups – in Cuba itself – and in other “folksy” genres from the Caribbean, Latin America, or Africa. I even saw it sometimes as part of the “repertoire” or standard set of percussionists even in ‘pop music” groups (modern Reggae, Funk, R&B). I even played them myself live (on Funk, Blues, Latin, or Reggae music).

Despite its evident place in “Black” music, I always wondered if their origins might by African or Amerindian. Also because I read somewhere about its historical use among Amerindians in the Americas, including in the Amazon region. Later I noted Shékere and other shaker uses in traditional African music, of course, roundish and gourd-based, but these could differ in shape from this “rounder” Maracas (with stick) shape.. I thought so, at least..

Here Ortiz gave me some useful answers in his book.

ROOTS AND ROUTES

As the Wikipedia-articles are short and not very informative, I could not find much before. Under the name Ortiz used, “maracas”, there were at least only short articles in Wikipedia in English and Dutch – of mediocre quality - , and a bit a longer one in Spanish, also not very good.

By the way, the terminology in the Netherlands is kind of funny, as the Maracas are also known in Dutch as “sambaballen”, literally: “samba balls” . One might think: just colloquially, I imagine?.. no, even semi-official. Of course it is not correct, especially since not used (round maracas) as such in Brazilian samba. Brazil has its own known “shakers” (like the cylindrical Ganza, different from Maracas), besides similar, “roundish” Maracas with stick (named also Maracas in Brazil). The “vague exotic” as reference in Dutch.. There was even carnival pop hit song about it, high on the Dutch charts with “samba-ballen” in the title, by comedian André van Duin. Admittedly, not "high" culture or comedy (according to some), but the term "sambaballen" is still used in Dutch, if erroneous.

Ortiz pays some attention to the etymology of “maracas”. Not uninteresting, but with the risk of becoming tedious, after finding out that the word has Amerindian origins, comparing among languages. Some authors (including those cited on Wikipedia) trace the term “maraca” back to the Guarani in and around Paraguay.

He pays more attention to origins of the instrument itself, and this I found more interesting. It is a bit blemished – maybe – by some less-political correct terminology (by today’s standards), but overall very engaging and educational.

PRIMITIVE

Ortiz associates the shaker use with “primitive” cultures, and takes on a global approach. Africa, Asia, the Americas: all knew “shaker” or “maraca”-like instruments.

He details the “sacred” and ritual use of maracas in various Amerindian cultures, such as the Tupi in the Amazon region, among the Guarani, the Guyanas, among the Inca, in Mexico, and further concentrating on the Arowaks (or Tainos) that once lived in Cuba, before Columbus. The maracas were used with different intensities – or not at all - among Amerindian groups, dependent further on period. It was even – according to some scholars – not known before a certain period, when maize growing began in Central America, then on to the Amazon and Guyanas region, from which the Arawaks later travelled to Cuba and other Caribbean islands.

Interestingly to consider, how Ortiz describes, that “maracas” are now absent in more developed, modern societies like Europe, unlike other types of instruments. Too primitive or natural, seems the suggestion. Shaker sounds only survived as indirect references in folk genres in (very) rural parts of Italy, Greece, and Spain. The modern city killed the “soft-sounding”, rustic Maracas, it seemed, one can say.

Its sound (which Ortiz compares to rainfall, one can say ‘jungle sounds” too) is also directly connected to a more (tropical) natural life and surroundings. The African and Amerindian societies, moreover, kept Maracas use alive up to in present-day music, amid modernity.. An interesting fact.

In their early stage, the maracas/shaker use was not yet so widespread in the Americas, yet there is historical evidence of Maracas use among at least a part of Taino or Arawaks in Cuba before Columbus, also living on in folk stories.

CUBA

With the arrival of Columbus, colonization, and destruction, many “pure” Tainos (related to Arawaks) disappeared from Cuba: slavery, death, while the remaining ones mixed with Europeans and Africans in Cuba.

When I was in Cuba, I heard that the remaining Arawak (or in Spanish: Tainos) Amerindian blood was visible in racial mixtures of people in the region around the Far East of Cuba (around Baracoa), and some pockets in Eastern Cuba, and in the Far West (tobacco growing), Pinar Del Río part of Cuba.

What’s said in the Wikipedia article: that they are of Amerindian origin, including the well-known Cuban one, is according to this book of Ortiz not entirely true..

He emphasizes in Cuba the relevance of two sources of origins for maracas: the Americas, but also Africa.

He not even states that Africans saw the Maraca used by indigenous Arawaks in Cuba, and that that “reminded” them of their own, but goes further. He points out that Africans despite enslavement could bring their own Maracas-like shakers, according to African values and aesthetics, preferring these over local, present ones, even if having to remake them in Cuba.

In the case of e.g. Venezuela or parts of Colombia, where Amerindians far outnumbered Africans, the Africans there might indeed copy Amerindian models, but in the case of Cuba, according to Ortiz, the Africans brought their own models from Africa.

USE

He pays attention to the use of maracas among Afro-Cubans and in Africa, partly sacred, though to a lesser degree than among the Amerindians. It was after all used also mainly musically and rhythmically in African cultures, besides in some spiritual traditions, such as of Yoruba and Congo origin. For the latter, special, “holy” seeds or stone or wood pieces were gathered for the Maracas’ inside.

In Amerindian cultures there was a musical use too, but more often also ritual among some peoples, with not even a musical, but rather “sonic” (messages, healing, other rituals) function.

In some parts of Africa – such as the South East (Mozambique a.a.), there is a specific “female” reserved use for Maracas. Some other parts of Africa too, but within Cuba, Ortiz did not note any “prescribed” gender distinction in Maraca use among Afro-Cubans.

In the neo-African Rastafari tradition, originating in Jamaica since the 1930s, such a gender distinction is found in (spiritual) Nyahbinghi drumming (and chanting) sessions, around “heart beat” rhythms, with clear African musical retentions (Ghana, Congo), but also Protestant and Biblical influences. Maracas/shakers tend to play along with the drummed “heart beats” in Nyabinghi sessions. These drummers are traditionally only men, while women could sing along, and were “allowed” to play shakers, often a kind of wooden maraca, similar in roundish shape to the Cuban ones, only often bigger and decorated), but women were not allowed to play the drums.

Whether this gender distinction is actually a direct African retention like the Congo/Kumina “heart beat” drumming or Kete drums, or rather a later, even “Bible-influenced” rule, added in Protestant-influenced Jamaica, is hard to determine. Some Nyahbinghi Rastas assume an African retention, others refer to the Bible.

DEVELOPMENTS

He further sketches developments of the forms of Maracas, from almost purely natural calabashes and gourds with dried seeds - natural shakers, so to speak - to “man-made” ones (with sticks). Such old, “natural” gourd shakers are still used in traditional Igbo music (SE Nigeria), for instance, and elsewhere in Africa.

Proper man-made Maracas, Ortiz further explains, have that stick through the whole and to the top, else – with loose stick added – it is mostly “for tourist” souvenir of Cuba use, and less enduring. Sizes and seed use came to differ over time, being originally comparable in size to “oranges”, but bigger maracas (like say: a melon- or watermelon-size) developed too. Colombian-syle maracas tend to be these bigger ones.. Material changed from gourd to other fruits, wood, and later even metal and other material.

That is where the “route” more or less stops, as Ortiz pays much more attention to the “roots” of maracas, than its routes. He follows the historical “route” a bit, but not into the various Cuban (or Latin American) music genres of recent times..

He wrote this in the 1950s, but these (Son, Rumba, Mambo, etcetera) existed by then too. In this book – and in others of the series – he addresses more the Afro-Cuban religious/spiritual use, such as in Santería and Congo (Mayombe) religions.

In another book, about Abakuá instruments, he points out that these do not use shakers or maracas, but African traditions of Yoruba or Congo origin, like Santería and Mayombe quite a lot of shakers, also historically.

The common use of Maracas in early forms of Son, the Son Changui, in Guantánamo, Eastern Cuba, might point at a Congo, rather than an Amerindian origin, as long assumed. There is after all a strong Congo influence in Eastern Cuba, noticeable in Son music (and related later Salsa, Bachata, and other genres), also because of the high percentage of slaves from the Congo region in Eastern Cuba.

It became common in popular Cuban music, a route this book by Ortiz only hints at, and with that influenced other Latin American and Caribbean genres. He takes this use in Cuba for granted, hinting further at indications of more future use by Western musicians, or in classical music..

Ortiz also chose to give practical playing information, though in a broad sense, and other “material” issues, such as of what’s the variation of seeds used inside the Maracas. From etymology, he deduces that in the Congo region originally maize/corn seeds tended to be used. Later more varied seeds, or stones. Even non-natural pieces.

CONCLUSION

Fernando Ortiz’s short study for his book on Maracas, is thus more about its origins, and gives quite some practical and material details of the instrument.

Its spread throughout different Caribbean and Latin music genres would of course be an interesting topic, including aspects like different uses/playing styles.

That is left more, presumably, to musicologists or historians.

Still, I found the book about Maracas useful and informative for me, especially teaching me about the Maracas’ roots, as both Amerindian and African, in the case of Cuba. A good tree needs good roots – like a natural foundation -, and the “branches” of this firmly rooted tree – on which percussionists like me move – then grow by themselves..

The Spanish text on the book’s back cover uses “big words” for Ortiz’s works on ‘Los instrumentos de la musica afrocubana’, describing the series of books as “monumental” and even “no superada hasta ahoy”, translatable as: “not outdone (or improved) up to today” – even if going back to the 1950s.

Big words, but at least regarding the “roots” and origins of the Maracas, Fernando Ortiz’s small, anthropological book The Maracas, remains indeed foundational, and the main information source, cited/quoted also in later academic studies on Cuban and other music.. It was in that sense “groundbreaking”, even this small book on Maracas I discussed here.

I think, anyway, that these origins are good to know for me, as a percussion player, perhaps even necessary..