Description
Book SynopsisThis entertaining history of Cuba and its music begins with the collision of Spain and Africa and continues through the era of Miguelito Valdés, Arsenio Rodríguez, Benny Moré, and Pérez Prado. It offers a behind-the-scenes examination of music from a Cuban point of view, unearthing surprising, provocative connections and making the case that Cuba was fundamental to the evolution of music in the New World. The ways in which the music of black slaves transformed 16th-century Europe, how the
claves appeared, and how Cuban music influenced ragtime, jazz, and rhythm and blues are revealed. Music lovers will follow this journey from Andalucía, the Congo, the Calabar, Dahomey, and Yorubaland via Cuba to Mexico, Puerto Rico, Saint-Domingue, New Orleans, New York, and Miami. The music is placed in a historical context that considers the complexities of the slave trade; Cuba's relationship to the United States; its revolutionary political traditions; the music of Santería, Palo, Abakuá, and Vodú; and much more.
Trade Review"As enthralling as it is comprehensive, [Sublette's] book breathes life and fire into the whole history of Cuban music." --Bonnie Raitt
"Essential . . . a solid, supremely lush effort." -- Publishers Weekly
"Like none other...a chronicle as much of the music itself as of the histories embedded in the sounds." --The Boston Phoenix
"It was Cuba that turned beat around, and thanks to Sublette any serious music fan will now know why." -- The New York Times Book Review
"If you buy only one book on Cuba in your Life . . . this is the one." -- The Nation
"Ned, a New Yorker, has painted with a latin passion a huge fresco of Cuba and its music with exquisite and astounding details. A real page turner!" --Georges Collinet, host of Afropop Worldwide
"Sublette's book does for the field of Cuban popular music what Perez Prado's 'Mambo Number Five' did for the mambo--bring the tradition to world attention in a rich and most fabulous way." --Robert Farris Thompson, author of Flash of the Spirit:African and Afro-American Art and Philosopy
"Magesterial . . . absorbing . . . fascinating . . . enlightening . . . compulsively readable pages . . . anyone (interested in Cuban music) should be reading this right now." --pitchforkmedia.com
Table of ContentsThe Highest-Priced Slaves; Drums of War; "We Have Always Had the Drum"; Zarabanda's Mambo; The Areito and the Romance; By Post from the Indies; The Shipyard; The Fertile Crescent; The Atlantis of the Caribbean; Buying Whites and Selling Blacks: A Contradanza; La Nuit des Tropiques; The Western and Central Sudanic Blues; The Congo That Was Cuba; A Secret Language, for Men Only; Hiding in Plain Sight; The Romance of Revolution; Rumba; Fire; Marti's Monster; Guitar and Piano; If He Bathes, He Splashes You; The Tango Age; Tres and Bongo; The Dance of the Millions; The Son Boom; The Mulata Love triangles; The Peanut Vendor; The Fall; The Revolution of 1933; The Liberation of the Drum; Nagüe, Nagüe, Nagüe, Nagüe; Mano a Mano; Biablo!; Life is a Dream; Mambo Number Five; Television; Index.
