Los PLeneros de La 21:

expressing Puerto rican Culture and History Through Music

Note to the reader: The following information is a compilation of various sources from written documentation, as well as from life experiences of individual artists of LP21 ensemble and other practitioners. We hope that you find this useful, which we encourage you expand on.

PuerTo riCo Puerto Rico is an island archipelago at the end of the chain of the Greater Antilles Islands in the Caribbean. Long before the Europeans arrived, Puerto Rico was a homeland of the Tano Arawak. This indigenous people, originally from South America, began migrating northward into the Caribbean as early as 500 BC. They established their main settlements on the islands today known as the Bahamas, Hispaniola, Cuba, Jamaica and Puerto Rico. They called Puerto Rico Boriqun, or Land of the Great Lords. The Arawak were a peaceful people who lived by farming, hunting and fishing. Corn and cassava were their most important crops. They lived in permanent villages called yucayeques, each governed by a cacique or chief. The Arawaks worshiped various deities and they used carved idols of stone, clay, wood or goldcalled cem (zeh-mee)to drive away evil spirits and ensure a good harvest.

brought in to replace the Tano not in the gold mine but on the burgeoning plantation system that began to develop throughout the colonies held by Spain. Africans from the Mandinga, Woloff, Igbo, Ashante, Yoruba, Bantu and Kongo nations were brought to Puerto Rico. Like the Tano, they consistently revolted and ran away to the hills, mangroves and swamps, most times intermingling and establishing communities throughout the island. Those who remained on the plantation as well as those who were free established a cultural foothold. Foods, expressions, religion as well as the music of these many African cultures influenced and enriched Puerto Rican culture. From their Arawak, Spanish and African heritage, Puerto Ricans forged a strong identity as a Spanish-speaking Caribbean people.

This helped to shape, to a large extent, the broad cultural divisions created by two disparate patterns of economy Christopher Columbus landed on Puerto Rico on and settlement. Small inland farms of Puerto Rico, for November 19, 1493, during his second voyage. In example, were typically worked by Spanish settlers 1508, Juan Ponce de Len was sent from the Spanish whose virtual isolation allowed some musical forms colony in nearby Santo Domingo to conquer Boriqun and a passion for stringed instruments to be passed for Spain. The Spanish divided up the land among them on from generation to generation into the present. and forced the Arawaks to work in gold mines and on By contrast, it was percussion-dominated music that farms and ranches. After three years, the Arawaks took root among descendants of the enslaved Africans revolted against this cruel treatment. But the rebellion who labored on plantations scattered throughout was crushed, and forced labor and disease greatly coastal areas of the island. In Puerto Rico, as in many reduced the Arawak population. other countries in the Americas where the institution of slavery existed, a strong African cultural presence Those who remained intermarried with the Spanish endures in the realm of contemporary popular music, settlers, producing a people of mixed Spanish-Arawak and is most evident in two older music and dance ancestry or criollos. A few settlers owned large coffee styles, bomba and plena and sugar plantations. But most were landless laborers, sharecroppers, or farmers growing just enough food for their own families. These small farmers were called jbaros. As the Arawak population declined, the Puerto Rican plantation owners turned to African slavery. Slaves were

BoMBa and PLena Bomba and Plena are the genres standing at the core of Afro-Puerto Rican musical expression. Each has its particular historical trajectory and musical distinctiveness. Bomba has been said to date back to the 17th Century, while plena is a product of the early 20th Century. Bomba is an umbrella term for a multiplicity of regional styles, rhythmic patterns and associated dance styles that were initially cultivated by Africans and their descendants in the context of plantation and counterplantation life in early colonial Puerto Rico. Centuries later, this music still gives voice to long-standing traditions and at the same time has remained anything but static. It is customarily sung in call and response fashion and played on barrel-shaped drums (barriles), one of which engages in a rhythmic dialogue with dancers and lends bomba a particularly participatory quality. A dancer literally makes music through his or her movements since the lead drummer is translating these movements into sound via the skin of the drum. Other instruments typically used include the maraca and the cu or fu (two sticks played against the wood of the barriles or another piece of wood). Plena has its origin among urban workers of coastal areas, particularly Ponce and Mayagez, shortly after Spain lost political control over Puerto Rico and, thus, during the early period of U.S. colonialism in Puerto Rico. Its distinctive percussion instruments are the panderetas, a set of hand drums of different sizes. Like bomba, its verses are also call and response, but with a much more pronounced emphasis on lyrical narration of daily life and satirical commentary on currents events. Many of the most famous traditional plenas like Mamita lleg el Obispo and Cortaron a Elena are based on historical events of the early 20th Century. Each new generation of pleneros produces a new body of work based on current events and inserted in their specific historical context, so that through the course of its existence, plena has offered and continues to offer a great many diverse lyrical and musical narratives of Puerto Rican life both in the Island and the Diaspora. The same is truethough not as sharply pronounced of bomberos and bomba.
(The following is a segment of the liner notes by Dr. Raquel Z. Rivera for LP21s Para Todos Ustedes CD, Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, 2005.)

Los PLeneros de La 21 Los Pleneros de la 21 is true to that long-standing spirit of firmly rooted yet constantly evolving musical traditions. Bomba and plena are the genres at the core of Los Pleneros de la 21s body of work. Yet, msica jbara, jazz and salsaeven rock and rap, as well as various other genresare palpable influences in their repertoire. Los Pleneros de la 21 inhabit a vital and distinctive space in the contemporary Puerto Rican musical landscape, achieving an uncommon and magnificent balance between tradition and innovation, professional accolades and community acclaim, formally-trained musicianship and vibrant street-based traditions. The present album evidences that, with ever-increasing success, they continue to hone this skillful navigation between forces frequently perceived as rivals. The group was founded in The South Bronx twenty-four years ago by the late master plenero Marcial Reyes and his mentee Juan Gutirrez, who in 1996 was awarded the prestigious National Heritage Fellow award by the National Endowment of the Arts. Dubbed by ethnomusicologist Nick Spitzer as the premiere bomba and plena group in the United States, Los Pleneros de la 21 is also a solid and beloved East Harlem grassroots institution with an educational mission and a strong community following. They have graced the stages of Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center and Symphony Space, as well as countless other highly-esteemed venues throughout the continental United States, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Mxico, Canada, Australia and Russia. Yet, they also regularly play and hold workshops at New York City public and private schools, universities and community events throughout the Tri-State Area and all over the US. Their educational work with children and teenagers through their Childrens Workshop is unparalleled and widely commended. Their events have become famed and eagerly awaited East Harlem yearly traditions: Las Fiestas de Cruz, An Evening With the Masters, Fiesta Navidea (Christmas Party) and The Childrens Workshop Graduation. Their relationship with other grassroots organizations, most notably Rincn Criollo Cultural Center (La Casita de Chema) in the South Bronx, is notable and of vital importance in keeping these musical traditions and educational efforts grounded in community life.

Word on the street is Los Pleneros de la 21 know how to make audiences dance to the point of absolute exhaustion while still letting plena and bomba shine, rather than going the more familiar commercial route of mostly using them as flavorings to spice up other music genres. (Not to say that the latter is not valid or even necessary, but we do need some variety up in here!)

Bomba drum (Barril de Bomba) The exemplary instrument of la bomba, a classic cut of West Africanderived drums, is at the core of the bomba celebration (baile de bomba). Usually played by groups of two or three drummers, bombas, like panderetas, play specific roles in the ensemble. After the lead singer calls for a specific song or style, the supporting lowertuned bomba drums or buleadores, in addition to the cu or fu (a pair of sticks struck on the side of the Los Pleneros de la 21 disprove the myth that plena and drums or on a hard resonant surface) and the maraca bomba cannot make a party jump and inspire people provide a steady fundamental rhythm that has been to dance like salsa, merengue or reggaetn. Plena called for, the primo or subidorthe higher pitched and bomba may be traditional and folkloric, but lead drumwill improvise drum beats and will answer they are also popular and contemporary. These as a response to any challenge imposed by a dancer or deeply rooted genres are anything but frozen-in-time dancers in their own individual piquetes or dance steps and quaint spectacles to watch while comfortably and body motions. seated. On the contrary. That is why hundreds myself includedregularly pack their concerts and Guiro - Believed to have originated with the Caribbeans community events. That is why we are always eagerly Taino Arawak indigenous people, the guiro consists of awaiting their next performance. And that is why we, a grooved, tapered cylinder made of gourd, that the along with scores of new fans, will be celebrating the player scrapes with a stick or wood handle topped with long and admirable trajectory of Los Pleneros de la fine steel spikes or pullero. Within the Caribbean 21. music traditions, guiro is an essential instrument of the ensemble and its sound and rhythmic patters have reached a very high level of proficiency and artistry. Maraca - A quintessential part of Latin music, the maraca is another contribution of the Taino people, who called them Amaraca. Traditional maracas are made out of the hollowed shell of the fruit of the crescentia cujete evergreen tree. A piece of wood pierces through the shell as a handle and dried seeds or pebbles inside rattle when the musicians play the instrument. Cuatro - Considered the signature instrument of Puerto Rico, the cuatro is a small 10-stringed stringed instrument resembling a guitar. Traditionally, it is usually carved from solid blocks of laurel wood. Very little is known about the specific origin of the Cuatro. However, most experts believe that the Cuatro has existed on the island in one form or another for about 400 years, probably originating from Renaissance-era Spanish lutes or guitars. There are three main types of Cuatro: the Antiguo of 4 strings, the Southern Cuatro of 4 pairs of orders of strings, and the Cuatro Moderno of 5 orders and 10 strings. Available in different sizes and voicings, they can also be combined into large orchestras involving many players.

TradiTionaL insTruMenTs of PuerTo riCo Reflecting the remarkable blend of cultures that make up Puerto Rico, its traditional musical Instruments are often a response to those as adaptations of older indigenous, African, and European types. Pandereta The hand-held frame drum that epitomizes plena, is made of stretched animal skin over and a around a wood, metal or hard plastic frame. Typically, plena groups use three or more panderetas, each is tuned to a different pitch according to its particular role in the ensemble. While the lower pitch seguidores panderos establish the basic rhythm, a second drum in the middle range complements and answers the seguidor, while the high pitch requinto adopts the role of a piano or guitar accompanying the singer and embellishing or feeling in between verses, and at times it may improvise extensively.

LP21: THe arTisTs Juan J. Juango Gutirrez. After being reared in the musical street traditions of the San Juan neighborhoods, Juan studied the fundaments of music at Escuela Libre de Msica, and then he went on to study classical percussion at the Conservatorio de Msica in Hato Rey, which provide him with the opportunity to become a member of the Puerto Rican Symphony Orchestra. After he migrated with his wife to New York in 1976, Juan became profoundly interested in his native music as he became increasingly acquainted with the New York Puerto Rican community, After establishing himself as a Broadway percussionist, he began studying with renowned Master Plena practitioner and artisan Marcial Reyes Arvelo. In 1983, he co-formed Los Pleneros de la 21in association with his mentor. Juan received a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship in 1996. He also holds several music and academic degrees. Juango is the mastermind behind the outstanding recording works of Los Pleneros de la 21; including LP21s most recent the Smithsonian Folkways release Para Todos Ustedes/ For All of You, nominated for the 48th Annual Grammy Awards for Best Traditional World Music Album. nellie Tanco, lead vocalist and dancer and a percussionist, Ms. Tanco grew up in a musical family in Puerto Rico, where the traditions of bomba and plena were ever present. Her father taught her to play the pandereta at an early age. She has performed widely as a singer and actress. sam Charles sammy Tanco, lead vocalist. In the mid sixties, Sammy was the co-founder of the pioneering Arts and Crafts Workshop at El Museo del Barrio, known today as the Puerto Rican Workshop, a renowned Puerto Rican arts institution lead by artists. He has been an important collaborator and key figure of the plena movement in New York as well as in Puerto Rico during the past 40 years. He joined LP21 in 1984. edgardo Miranda, cuatro master, composer, and arranger. A self-taught cuatro player, Edgardo transcends musical styles and genres with his ample experience, and acute sensibility in the performance practice of the instrument. Early in his career in Puerto Rico, he worked with the most popular bands and hotels house bands and all over the island, most notably with the great Puerto Rican trumpet player Juan Torres and the legendary percussionist Rafael

Cortijo. In the United States, he made a name with Latin legends Ismael Rivera and Tito Puente, whom he recorded the Grammy winner Latin Jazz hit On Broadway. He has performed world-wide with jazz and traditional music groups, most recently with Grammy winner Cuban pianist Bebo Valdez. Edgardo has been central to LP21s musical development, since he joined the group in 1984 . donald nicks, bassist. Donald is a consummate musician and one of the most sought after bassists in the NYC music scene. He has recorded and performed in a wide array of musical genres all over the world. Donald joined LP21 in 1984. Jos Rivera, lead vocalist and drummer. Jos has been instrumental in bringing traditional Puerto Rican music to diverse audiences through his performing, teaching, and instrument building demonstrations in New York City and abroad for more than 25 years. He joined LP21 in 1987. Hctor Tito Matos, lead vocals, percussionist. Considered one of the most skillfull requinto pandero players of his generation, Tito started his professional career starts with local plena groups, most notably the legendary Los Pleneros de la 23 Abajo. After moving to NY in 1994, he becomes a member of Los Pleneros de la 21, whom he recorded and traveled all over the United States, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Australia. In 1997, Tito lead his own group, Viento de Agua, and was featured as a singer, percussionist, composer and arranger. He also recorded with Eddie Palmieri, David Sanchez, William Cepeda amd Ralph Irizarri. A LP artist, Tito moved back to Puerto Rico where he is busy as a band leader, clinician and a leading figure in the reinvigorated popular plena movement Plenazos Callejeros, dedicated to promoting awareness about the performance of Puerto Rican plena. Most recently he was featured in the latest recording and TV special of world superstar Ricky Martin. Jos Lantgua Rubiera, pianist, arranger, and composer, has performed and arranged in a wide spectrum of Latin styles with and for noted musical artists and orchestras. He joined LP21 in 1995.

Julia Loza Gutirrez-Rivera, dancer. Ms. GutirrezRivera was weaned on bomba and plena and then received formal training at LP21s Bomba & Plena Childrens Workshop. When not dancing, she is an arts administrator. A charismatic dancer and performer, Julia has worked with the main traditional performing groups in NYC and has lead the way of LP21s renovated artistic energy. Camilo ernesto Molina Gaetn, at 17 years of age he is rapidly becoming an excellent percussionist and overall musician. At 10 he took third price in the Thelonious Monk International Percussion and AfroLatin Jazz Competition. He joined LP21s Bomba & Plena Childrens Workshop at 2 and as a professional musician he joined the LP21 ensemble at 10. Obanil Ir Ayende Solana, percussionist and dancer. Obanil has studied and performed widely. His talents have earned him the respect of his musical elders. He joined LP21s Bomba & Plena Childrens Workshop at 12, to later become part of the group at 22. alexander Lasalle, singer, drummer. Traditional singer, percussionist, dancer, researcher and lecturer of the oral history of Afro Antillean traditions. Mr. LaSalle is also the artistic director of Alma Moy, a traditional Puerto Rican bomba ensemble. He was the lead vocalist of two world premier plena compositions by Juan Gutierrez at the plena concert events.

Contact Information: Juan J Gutirrez, Director Los Pleneros de la 21 1680 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10029 Tel 212-427-5221Fax 212-427-5339 fax pleneros21@aol.com www.losplenerosdela21.org

RECORDINGS BY LOS PLENEROS DE LA 21 Para Todos Ustedes, Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, 2005. Puerto Rico Tropical, Music of the World, 1997. Somos Boricuas: Bomba Y Plena En Nueva York, Henry Street, 1996. Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico, Shanachie Records, 1990.