РефератыИностранный языкSaSalsa Essay Research Paper Salsa MusicSalsa Music

Salsa Essay Research Paper Salsa MusicSalsa Music

Salsa Essay, Research Paper


Salsa Music


Salsa Music a popular genre of Latin American music. Since its


emergence in the mid-1960s, salsa has achieved worldwide


popularity, attracting performers and audiences not only in Latin


American communities but also in such non-Latin countries as Japan


and Sweden. In terms of style and structure, salsa is a


reinterpretation and modernization of Cuban dance-music styles.


It emerged around 1900 as an urban, popular dance-music style in


Cuba. It derived some features from Hispanic music, including its


harmonies and the use of the guitar and a similar instrument called


the tres. To these, it added characteristics of the rumba, a style of


dance music with Afro-Cuban origins. Features derived from the


rumba include a rhythmic pattern known as clave and a two-part


formal structure. This structure consists of a songlike first section


followed by a longer second section featuring call-and-response


vocals and instrumental improvisations over a repeated chordal


pattern. By the 1940s the son had become the most popular dance


music in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and much of urban Africa; Puerto Ricans


who moved to New York City brought the son with them.


The 1950s were a particularly dynamic period for Cuban dance


music. Cuban and Puerto Rican performers in Havana, Cuba, and


New York City popularized the mambo as a predominantly


instrumental, big-band style. The mambo, together with the


medium-tempo chachach?, enjoyed considerable popularity in the


United States. Most importantly, the son was modernized by


adaptation to horn-based ensembles of 10 to 15 musicians and


distinctive, often jazz-influenced instrumental styles.


By the 1950s, New York City had become host to a large and


growing Puerto Rican community. A wave of social and political


activism, cultural self-assertion, and artistic ferment swept through


this community in the 1960s. The newly founded Fania Records


successfully promoted several young performers of Cuban-style


dance music, and the music?now repackaged as salsa?became


linked to the sociopolitical effervescence of the era. Bandleaders


such as Willie Colon, Rub?n Blades, Johnny Pacheco, Ray Barretto,


and Eddie Palmieri led the musical movement, in which salsa


became a self-conscious vehicle for Latino pride, unity, and


mobilization throughout the Hispanic Caribbean Basin countries and


among Latino communities in the eastern United States. Most


importantly, however, salsa, with its intricate and driving rhythms,


its brilliant horn arrangements, and its searing vocals, served as an


exuberant and exhilarating dance music.


By the mid-1970s, salsa had become the dominant popular music


idiom in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean, with Venezuela and


Colombia emerging as music centers to rival New York City. But


during the 1980s, salsa?s themes of Latin unity and sociopolitical


idealism diminished. In addition, the genre faced new competition,


especially in New York City and Puerto Rico, from the merengue, a


dance-music style from the Dominican Republic. Nevertheless, salsa


has remained popular among younger generations of Latinos, who


tend to favor a smoother, more sentimental style known as salsa


rom?ntica, popularized by such bandleaders as Eddie Santiago and


Tito Nieves. Notable salsa singers of the 1990s included Linda


“India” Caballero and Mark Anthony.

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