1.
San Luis, Santiago de Cuba
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San Luis is a town and municipality in the Santiago de Cuba Province of Cuba. It is located 19 km north of Santiago de Cuba, the city was founded in 1827 on the location of a ranch. Arrival of the railroad accelerated its development San Luis achieved municipality status on 19 August 1898, in 2004, the municipality of San Luis had a population of 88,496. With a total area of 498 km2, it has a density of 177. 7/km2. The municipality is divided into the barrios of Dos Caminos, La Luz, Majaguabo, Monte Dos Leguas, Norte and Sur
2.
Cuba
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Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is a country comprising the island of Cuba as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located in the northern Caribbean where the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, and it is south of both the U. S. state of Florida and the Bahamas, west of Haiti, and north of Jamaica. Havana is the largest city and capital, other cities include Santiago de Cuba. Cuba is the largest island in the Caribbean, with an area of 109,884 square kilometres, prior to Spanish colonization in the late 15th century, Cuba was inhabited by Amerindian tribes. It remained a colony of Spain until the Spanish–American War of 1898, as a fragile republic, Cuba attempted to strengthen its democratic system, but mounting political radicalization and social strife culminated in the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1952. Further unrest and instability led to Batistas ousting in January 1959 by the July 26 Movement, since 1965, the state has been governed by the Communist Party of Cuba. A point of contention during the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, a nuclear war broke out during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Culturally, Cuba is considered part of Latin America, Cuba is a Marxist–Leninist one-party republic, where the role of the vanguard Communist Party is enshrined in the Constitution. Independent observers have accused the Cuban government of human rights abuses. It is one of the worlds last planned economies and its economy is dominated by the exports of sugar, tobacco, coffee, according to the Human Development Index, Cuba is described as a country with high human development and is ranked the eighth highest in North America. It also ranks highly in some metrics of national performance, including health care, the name Cuba comes from the Taíno language. The exact meaning of the name is unclear but it may be translated either as where fertile land is abundant, authors who believe that Christopher Columbus was Portuguese state that Cuba was named by Columbus for the town of Cuba in the district of Beja in Portugal. Before the arrival of the Spanish, Cuba was inhabited by three distinct tribes of indigenous peoples of the Americas, the Taíno, the Guanajatabey, and the Ciboney people. The ancestors of the Ciboney migrated from the mainland of South America, the Taíno arrived from Hispanola sometime in the 3rd century A. D. When Columbus arrived they were the dominant culture in Cuba, having a population of 150,000. The name Cuba comes from the native Taíno language and it is derived from either coabana meaning great place, or from cubao meaning where fertile land is abundant. The Taíno were farmers, while the Ciboney were farmers as well as fishers and hunter-gatherers, Columbus claimed the island for the new Kingdom of Spain and named it Isla Juana after Juan, Prince of Asturias. In 1511, the first Spanish settlement was founded by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar at Baracoa, other towns soon followed, including San Cristobal de la Habana, founded in 1515, which later became the capital
3.
Havana
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Havana is the capital city, largest city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city extends mostly westward and southward from the bay, which is entered through a narrow inlet, the sluggish Almendares River traverses the city from south to north, entering the Straits of Florida a few miles west of the bay. King Philip II of Spain granted Havana the title of City in 1592, walls as well as forts were built to protect the old city. The sinking of the U. S. battleship Maine in Havanas harbor in 1898 was the cause of the Spanish–American War. Contemporary Havana can essentially be described as three cities in one, Old Havana, Vedado and the suburban districts. The city is the center of the Cuban government, and home to various ministries, headquarters of businesses, the current mayor is Marta Hernández of the Communist Party of Cuba. In 2009, the city/province had the third highest income in the country, the city attracts over a million tourists annually, the Official Census for Havana reports that in 2010 the city was visited by 1,176,627 international tourists, a 20% increase from 2005. Old Havana was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1982, the city is also noted for its history, culture, architecture and monuments. As typical of Cuba, Havana also features a tropical climate, in May 2015, Havana was officially recognized as one of the New7Wonders Cities together with Vigan, Doha, La Paz, Durban, Beirut, and Kuala Lumpur. Most native settlements became the site of Spanish colonial cities retaining their original Taíno names, an alternate theory is that Habana is derived from the Middle Dutch word havene, referring to a harbour, etymologically related to the English word haven. All attempts to found a city on Cubas south coast failed, however, an early map of Cuba drawn in 1514 places the town at the mouth of this river. The town that became Havana finally originated adjacent to what was then called Puerto de Carenas, the quality of this natural bay, which now hosts Havanas harbor, warranted this change of location. Pánfilo de Narváez gave Havana – the sixth town founded by the Spanish on Cuba – its name, the name combines San Cristóbal, patron saint of Havana. Shortly after the founding of Cubas first cities, the served as little more than a base for the Conquista of other lands. Havana began as a port, and suffered regular attacks by buccaneers, pirates. The first attack and resultant burning of the city was by the French corsair Jacques de Sores in 1555, ships from all over the New World carried products first to Havana, in order to be taken by the fleet to Spain. The thousands of ships gathered in the bay also fueled Havanas agriculture and manufacture, since they had to be supplied with food, water. On December 20,1592, King Philip II of Spain granted Havana the title of City, later on, the city would be officially designated as Key to the New World and Rampart of the West Indies by the Spanish Crown
4.
Son cubano
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Son cubano is a genre of music and dance that originated in the highlands of eastern Cuba during the late 19th century. It is a genre that amalgamates elements of Spanish and African origin. Among its fundamental Hispanic components are the style, lyrical metre. On the other hand, its characteristic clave rhythm, call and response structure, around 1909 the son reached Havana, where the first recordings were made in 1917. This marked the start of its expansion throughout the island, becoming Cubas most popular, while early groups had between three and five members, during the 1920s the sexteto became the genres primary format. By the 1930s, many bands had incorporated a trumpet, becoming septetos, and in the 1940s a larger type of ensemble featuring congas and piano became the norm, the cojunto. Besides, the son became one of the ingredients in the jam sessions known as descargas that flourished during the 1950s. The international presence of the son can be traced back to the 1930s when many bands toured Europe and North America, similarly, radio broadcasts of son became popular in West Africa and the Congos, leading to the development of hybrid genres such as Congolese rumba. In the 1960s, New Yorks music scene prompted the rapid success of salsa, in Spanish, the word son, from Latin sonus, denotes a pleasant sound, particularly a musical one. In eastern Cuba, the term began to be used to refer to the music of the highlands towards the late 19th century, to distinguish it from similar genres from other countries, the term son cubano is most commonly used. In Cuba, various qualifiers are used to distinguish the variants of the genre. These include son montuno, son oriental, son santiaguero and son habanero, Son singers are generally known as soneros, and the verb sonear describes not only their singing but also their vocal improvisation. The adjective soneado refers to songs and styles which incorporate the tempo and syncopation of the son, generally, there is an explicit diffenrece between styles that incorporate elements of the son partially or totally, as evidenced by the distinction between bolero soneado and bolero-son. The term sonora refers to conjuntos with smoother trumpet sections such as Sonora Matancera and Sonora Ponceña, although the history of Cuban music dates back to the 16th century, the son is a relatively recent musical invention whose precursors emerged in the mid-to-late 19th century. Musicologists agree that the ancestors of the son appeared in Cubas Oriente Province. These forms flourished in the context of rural parties such as guateques, where bungas were known to perform, such early guitars are thought to have given rise to the tres some time around 1890 in Baracoa. The addition of a section composed of percussion instruments such as the bongó. Due to the very little historiographical and ethnomusicological research devoted to the son and this fallacy stemmed from the apocryphal origin story of a folk song known as Son de Má Teodora
5.
Bolero
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Bolero is a genre of slow-tempo Latin music and its associated dance. There are Spanish and Cuban forms which are significant and which have separate origins. The term is used for some art music. In all its forms, the bolero has been popular for over a century, the original Spanish bolero is a 3/4 dance that originated in Spain in the late 18th century, a combination of the contradanza and the sevillana. In Cuba, the bolero was perhaps the first great Cuban musical and vocal synthesis to win universal recognition, in 2/4 time, this dance music spread to other countries, leaving behind what Ed Morales has called the most popular lyric tradition in Latin America. The Cuban bolero tradition originated in Santiago de Cuba in the last quarter of the 19th century, it does not owe its origin to the Spanish music and song of the same name. In the 19th century there grew up in Santiago de Cuba a group of itinerant musicians who moved around earning their living by singing and playing the guitar, pepe Sanchez is known as the father of the trova style and the creator of the Cuban bolero. Untrained, but with natural talent, he composed numbers in his head. As a result, most of these numbers are now lost and he was the model and teacher for the great trovadores who followed. The Cuban bolero has traveled to Puerto Rico and the rest of Latin America after its conception, some of the boleros leading composers have come from nearby countries, as in the case of the prolific Puerto Rican composer Rafael Hernández and the Mexican Agustín Lara. Some Cuban composers of the bolero are primarily considered trovadores, boleros saw a resurgence in popularity during the 1990s when Mexican singer Luis Miguel was credited for reviving interest in the bolero genre following the release Romance. This adaptability was largely achieved by dispensing with limitations in format or instrumentation, examples would be, Bolero in the danzón, the advent of lyrics in the danzón to produce the danzonete. The bolero-son, long-time favourite dance music in Cuba, captured abroad under the misnomer rumba, the bolero-mambo in which slow and beautiful lyrics were added to the sophisticated big-band arrangements of the mambo. The bolero-cha, many Cha-cha-cha lyrics come from boleros, the lyrics of the bolero can be found throughout popular music, especially Latin dance music. A version of the Cuban bolero is danced throughout the Latin dance world under the misnomer rumba and this came about in the early 1930s when a simple overall term was needed to market Cuban music to audiences unfamiliar with the various Cuban musical terms. The famous Peanut Vendor was so labelled, and the label stuck for other types of Cuban music, in Cuba, the bolero is usually written in 2/4 time, elsewhere often 4/4. The tempo for dance is about 120 beats per minute, the music has a gentle Cuban rhythm related to a slow son, which is the reason it may be best described as a bolero-son. Like some other Cuban dances, there are three steps to four beats, with the first step of a figure on the second beat, the slow is executed with a hip movement over the standing foot, with no foot-flick
6.
Afro-Cuban All Stars
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Afro-Cuban All Stars is a Cuban band led by Juan de Marcos González. Their music is a mix of all the styles of Cuban music, including bolero, chachachá, salsa, son montuno, timba, guajira, danzón, rumba and abakua. They are known internationally for their 1997 album A Toda Cuba le Gusta, in early 1996 Nick Gold, head of World Circuit Records, invited Ry Cooder to participate in an experiment combining Cuban and African musicians. A group of Cuban musicians had already assembled, including Rubén González as the selected pianist. However, since the African musicians had experienced difficulties in obtaining visas, Cooder also played slide guitar on one track, Alto Songo. In the sleeve notes, de Marcos González, who directed the project and played tres, wrote, This album is dedicated to Rubén González, Cooder played guitars on all but one track. On the albums cover, Cooder is quoted as saying. A Cuban cross between Thelonious Monk and Felix the Cat, All three albums were released on Nick Golds World Circuit Records in 1997. In early 1998, Wim Wenders filmed a documentary entitled Buena Vista Social Club, a Toda Cuba le Gusta Distinto, Diferente Baila mi Son Bajando Gervasio Live in Japan Step Forward Absolutely Live
7.
Buena Vista Social Club
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The original Buena Vista Social Club held dances and musical activities, becoming a popular location for musicians to meet and play during the 1940s. The recording, named Buena Vista Social Club after the Havana institution, became a success. The success of both the album and film sparked a revival of interest in traditional Cuban music and Latin American music in general, some of the Cuban performers later released well-received solo albums and recorded collaborations with stars from different musical genres. The Buena Vista Social Club was a club located in the populous Marianao neighborhood. Buena Vista means good view in Spanish, according to Juan Cruz, a former master of ceremonies at the Salon Rosado Benny Moré nightclub in Havana, the club was located on Calle 31 between 46 and 48. When musicians Ry Cooder, Compay Segundo and a crew attempted to identify the location of the club in the 1990s. The club was run along the lines of a Cabildo, a community dating back to Spanish colonialism. According to American guitarist Ry Cooder, Prominent musicians who performed at the club during the 1930s and 1940s include bassist Cachao López and this had an immediate impact on the livelihoods of local entertainers. Consequently, the cultural and social centers were abolished, including the Afro-Cuban mutual aid Sociedades de Color in 1962, private festivities were limited to weekend parties and organizers funds were confiscated. The measures meant the closure of the Buena Vista Social Club, the emergence of pop music and salsa, a style derived from Cuban music but developed in the United States, meant that son music became even less common. Groups such as Los Van Van and Irakere established modern forms of Cuban music, paving the way for new rhythms, Cubas dance music had already inspired a change from the older son-style dances, as younger Cubans broke free of step-oriented dances. On Cooders arrival, it transpired that the musicians from Mali had not received their visas and were unable to travel to Havana, Cooder and Gold changed their plans and decided to record an album of Cuban son music with local musicians. A search for additional musicians led the team to singer Manuel Puntillita Licea, pianist Rubén González and octogenarian singer Compay Segundo, the sessions also produced material for the subsequent release, Introducing. Rubén González, which showcased the work of the Cuban pianist. One of the songs featured on the album was Buena Vista Social Club, a song written by Orestes López. The song spotlighted the piano work of Rubén González and it was recorded after Cooder heard González improvising around the musical theme before a days recording session. After playing the piece, González explained to Cooder the history of the social club, when searching for a name for the overall project, manager Nick Gold chose the songs title. According to Cooder, Upon release on 17 September 1997, the CD became a word of mouth hit. It sold more than five copies and won a Grammy award in 1998
8.
Gorillaz
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Gorillaz are a British virtual band created in 1998 by Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. The band consists of four animated members, 2D, Murdoc Niccals, Noodle and these members are fictional and are not personas of any real life musicians involved in the project. Their fictional universe is explored through the website and music videos, as well as a number of other media. In reality, Albarn is the only permanent musical contributor, writers and critics have described their music as alternative rock, Britpop, trip hop, hip hop, electronica, indie, dub, reggae and pop. The bands 2001 debut album Gorillaz sold over seven million copies and it was nominated for the Mercury Prize in 2001, but the nomination was later withdrawn at the bands request. Their second studio album Demon Days went five times platinum in the UK, the band has won other awards, including one Grammy Award, two MTV Video Music Awards, an NME Award, three MTV Europe Music Awards, and have been nominated for nine Brit Awards. The bands third album, Plastic Beach, was released in March 2010. Their fourth studio album called The Fall was released in December 2010 as a download for fan club members. After a five-year hiatus, Gorillaz announced their fifth studio album Humanz, musician Damon Albarn and comic book artist Jamie Hewlett met in 1990 when guitarist Graham Coxon, a fan of Hewletts work, asked him to interview Blur, a band Albarn and Coxon had recently formed. The interview was published in Deadline magazine, home of Hewletts comic strip, Hewlett initially thought Albarn was arsey, a wanker, despite becoming acquaintances with the band, they often did not get on, especially after Hewlett began seeing Coxons ex-girlfriend Jane Olliver. Despite this, Albarn and Hewlett started sharing a flat on Westbourne Grove in London in 1997, Hewlett had recently broken up with Olliver and Albarn was at the end of his highly publicised relationship with Justine Frischmann of Elastica. The idea to create Gorillaz came about when Albarn and Hewlett were watching MTV, Hewlett said, If you watch MTV for too long, its a bit like hell – theres nothing of substance there. So we got this idea for a band, something that would be a comment on that. Although not released under the Gorillaz name, Albarn has said one of the first ever Gorillaz tunes was Blurs 1997 single On Your Own. The bands first release was the EP Tomorrow Comes Today, released in 2000, the bands first single was Clint Eastwood and was released on 5 March 2001, reaching No.4 in the UK. The Phi Life Cypher version of Clint Eastwood appears on the B-side album G Sides, Later that same month, their first full-length album, the self-titled Gorillaz, was released, producing four singles, Clint Eastwood, 19-2000, Tomorrow Comes Today, and Rock the House. In June 2001, 19–2000 charted at No.6 in the UK, the end of the year brought the song 911, a collaboration between Gorillaz and hip hop group D12 and Terry Hall about the September 11 attacks. Gorillaz performed at the 2002 Brit Awards in London on 22 February, the band was nominated for four Brit Awards, including Best British Group, Best British Album and Best British Newcomer, but did not win any awards
9.
Afro-Cuban
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The term Afro-Cuban refers to Cubans who mostly have West African ancestry, and to historical or cultural elements in Cuba thought to emanate from this community. The term can refer to the combining of African and other elements found in Cuban society such as race, religion, music, language, the arts. According to a 2002 national census which surveyed 11.2 million Cubans,1.1 million Cubans described themselves as Black, thus a significant proportion of those living on the island affirm some African ancestry. A study from 2014 estimated the genetic admixture of the population of Cuba to be 72% European, 20% African, recently, many African immigrants have been coming to Cuba, especially from Angola. The percentage of Afro-Cubans on the island increased after the 1959 Cuban revolution led by Fidel Castro due to migration from the island of the largely white Cuban professional class. A small percentage of Afro-Cubans left Cuba, mostly for the United States, where they and their U. S. -born children are called Cuban Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and African Americans. Only a few of them resided in nearby Spanish-speaking country of Dominican Republic, the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami says 62% are black. In Equatorial Guinea, they part of the Emancipados, in Nigeria. Despite being free to return to Cuba when their tenure was over, the former slaves were brought to Africa by the Royal Orders of September 13,1845 and a June 20,1861 deportation from Cuba, due to the lack of volunteers. Similar circumstances previously occurred during the 17th century where ex-slaves from both Cuba and Brazil were offered the same opportunity, Angola also has communities of Afro-Cubans, Amparos. They are descendants of Afro-Cuban soldiers brought to the country in 1975 as a result of the Cuban involvement in the Cold War, Fidel Castro deployed thousands of troops to the country during the Angolan Civil War. As a result of this era, there exists a small Spanish-speaking community in Angola of Afro-Cubans numbering about 100,000, Haitian Creole and culture first entered Cuba with the arrival of Haitian immigrants at the start of the 19th century. Haiti was a French colony, and the years of the 1791–1804 Haitian Revolution brought a wave of French settlers fleeing with their Haitian slaves to Cuba. They came mainly to the east, and especially Guantánamo, where the French later introduced sugar cultivation, constructed sugar refineries, by 1804, some 30,000 French were living in Baracoa and Maisí, the furthest eastern municipalities of the province. Later, Haitians continued to come to Cuba to work as braceros in the fields cutting cane and their living and working conditions were not much better than slavery. Although they planned to return to Haiti, most stayed on in Cuba, for years, many Haitians and their descendants in Cuba did not identify themselves as such or speak Creole. In the eastern part of the island, many Haitians suffered discrimination, but according to the Castro regime, since 1959, when he took over, this discrimination has stopped. After Spanish, Creole is the second language in Cuba
