Salsa is the result of Cuban and Puerto rican immigration into New York in the 1960's and 70's, and it sounds absolutely magnificent. It's the happy upbeat feel of Guaracha mixed with the rhythm and texture of Son as well as instrumentation and harmonies from New-York jazz and blues bands that is proven to get people up and moving. Some of the most impressive dancers in the world are salsa dancers and although the basic idea of the dance style is simple, there is a lot of room to add whatever you'd like to add. Here's a pretty old example and what you might expect to hear in a restaurant or something.
El Brujo by Frankie Figueroa
Salsa was brought about in New-York when mostly Puerto Rican but some Cuban immigrants brought over music such as Son, Guaracha, and guaguanco. These styles fused with the vibrant New-York jazz scene exposing the puerto rican musicians to new harmonies, and the New-Yorkers to new and more complicated rhythmic idioms. This fusion also opened up a wonderful style of melodic improvisation, wich is a joy to play on the saxophone.
Salsa music is characterized by its combination of the Cuban rhythm section with a bright and often marcato brass section as well as an often wonderful vocalist. The structure of a typical salsa tune is as follows: introduction with solo vocal lines, followed by a call and response section including a piano rhythm called the montuno with brass features and punches (similar to that of a soul/funk band like Tower of Power or the Bar-Kays) called mambos. Montuno literally means "from the mountains and can be used to refer to this section, or to refer to a very wide variety of Latin music and non music things.
The typical salsa band has between 10 and 14 members and consists of lead vocals, Cuban rhythm section, piano, trombones, trumpets, Saxophones (often including Baritone), and sometimes the Puerto rican Cuatro which is a ten-stringed lute. The Cuban rhythm section includes: the bongos, the tumbadoras (congas), the timbales (two drums on a stand with bells in the middle), one or many cowbells, woodblock, claves (two fat wooden sticks), maracas, Shekere (a gourd covered in beads on a net), and guiro (a ribbed scraper).
Each instrument in the Cuban or salsa rhythm section has its very own part, very similar to African drumming, and as I have heard very difficult to play on the drum set. These parts are built around and governed by a two bar rhythm called the clave which is a group of two plus a group of three in the simplest of terms.The different parts have names but can vary as long as the base idea of what they are supposed to do is there. The bongos play the Martillo (literally translates to hammer) rhythm, which in its simplest form is straight eighth notes played on the high bongo except for the down beat of four played on the low bongo, returning to the high bongo on the and of four. the congas or Tumbadoras play a tumbao rhythm, which isolates to off beat and can be heard often in contemporary Latin music. The timbales play a Cascara, which is less reliant on the off beat but builds on the other rhythms well. The piano gets the Iconic Montuno rhythm meaning "from the mountains this rhythm is present throughout many Latin genres, and even Bossa Nova as well as the 3rd movement of the wind ensemble piece by Reinaldo Moya we played last fall. And finally, the clave gets to play the clave. Below is a basic and typical rhythm lineup you would see in a Cuban rhythm section.
The clave rhythm actually originated long before salsa sprung up in New-York, the two and three or three and two rhythm can actually be heard in Ghanaian Agbekor drumming and other west African drumming styles which obviously made their way to the Caribbean during the slave trade. Because of this, as well as the move to america in the 50', 60's and 70's there are varying ways to play it. The most popular two ways are the Son Clave, and the Rumba Clave, both very similar to each other as seen below.
The Three largest Antecedents of Salsa are: Son, which is where a large portion of the rhythmic and dance elements are derived from. Guaracha, which is where the singing style is derived from. And the New-York cool jazz style which brought in solo improvisation and jazz harmonies.
Salsa as a dance is just as important as salsa as a music, because similarly to many other Latin music genres, salsa is a genre that you are meant to dance to, and has a corrosponding dance style, like flamenco or tango. The salsa dance is fast paced and mostly danced by couples. It involved six steps that are performed over eight counts where every step involves a weight shift that is exclusive to the lower body with the upper body remaining level. This has become known as cuban hip movement despite the fact that it was created by Puerto rican immigrants in New-York. Dancers use their arms to communicate with and lead their partner in either a closed position (hand on back) or an open position (hand on hand).
Now for the fun part, this is my favorite salsa band "Bio Ritmo". They are mainly of Puerto rican descent but are based in virginia and have been together for around thirty years. Their brass section is absolutely killer but in the song below, El Timbalero Loco, Every element of salsa discussed above is present.
First off if you listen you can hear the clave playing a three two clave pattern, and all the other rhythmic elements as well. During the call and response section there is of course call and response, as well as the piano montuno and brass mambos. There is also quite a bit of solo improvisation.
another selection by Bio Ritmo is Picaresca.
And Mirame de Frente as performed by Ray Barretto
As you can see, salsa is sick and awesome and cool and its a genre filled with bangers, definitely the best dance music. Salsa music has been a part of my life since I was a little kid and I am very happy to have shared some information about it with others.
Sources
Lise Waxer, "Salsa", 1/20/2001,
https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/display/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.00 01/omo-9781561592630-e-0000024410 Grove Music Online.
used for general information about salsa music
Claude Conyers, "Salsa" 2/23/2011
https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/display/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo- 9781561592630-e-1002092687?rskey=jIxyGv&result=2 Grove Music Online
Once again the amount of influence that African music has on the somewhere as far as New York is amazing. I mean I'm aware that we have taken many aspects of African music within many different genres it is still cool to really see it.
I like how you were able to link salsa to the African drumming we learned about in class. I also liked learning about clave rhythms; I had heard of them before but didn’t really know what they were.
I always thought it would be cool to learn Salsa dancing. I appreciate how heavy the presence of the clave is in Salsa music, it's something I've thought was really cool for a while but never knew the origins or its complexities.
Salsa is such a cool genre! I love how fun and interesting the style is. It's really cool to see the link between the rhythms in African drumming and in the Clave rhythm. I thought you explained that really well!
I always enjoy some salsa. It gets the blood flowing. I have realized through the past year how similar it is to African drumming and how it all ties together. I never knew how complex the correlation was though.
I enjoyed reading this, and I liked how detailed you were about things I also didn't realize how complex it was. I like how you included visual representations of what you were talking about.
My favorite saxophonists are Coleman Hawkins, Ornette Coleman, Nobuya Sugawa, Eric Marienthal, and a whole lot more, It's like an endless list. It wasn't until recently that I realized there aren't any women on this list, in fact I did't know very many female saxophone players at all, I think I've met four in total. Also whenever I see a video online of a woman playing the saxophone, the critique is always much heavier in the comment section, so I thought I would share my three favorite female saxophone players. Jess Gillam is a British saxophonist, she started playing saxophone at seven, and has said in an interview that she would not conform to the classical saxophone expectations. This is her recording of Pequena Czarda by Peter Iturralde and when listening to her play it versus a ride or die classical player play it, you'd hear a heavier articulation, and a brighter sound, which may not win you a saxophone competition but it sound really nice. Theres a s...
On the island of Trinidad in 1884, the Colonial British government imposed a law that highly restricted the use of drums with drum heads made from animal skin. This caused the lower class population, specifically in Port of Spain, to turn to alternatives such as "Tamboo Bamboo" , which is a term used to describe an ensemble of various lengths of bamboo being struck on the ground or with a stick in poly-rhythm. Over time, these ensembles gained scrap metal instruments made from retired household items, or barrels meant for storing oil. Eventually the bamboo was replaced by metal objects, specifically the steel oil drums that were so commonly found around the Island at the time. By the 1940's, people called "tuners" had developed the technique of hammering metal paint cans in order to make them produce a certain pitch when struck which developed into the modern steel drum. Many accredit the creation of the first steel pan to Winston "Spree" Simon, the ...
My name is Dale Watson and these are three certified BANGERS. Banger #1, A.K.A. Something I'd put on a playlist right now "Migration" by Camel A little over a year ago I started going through my dad's records and CD's from the 70's and found what can only be described as an overwhelming amount of prog-rock. I got introduced to one of my new favorite genres of music. I like this song a lot because of the way it naturally grooves despite being in 7/8 which is a fairly uncommon way to write in the west, but it works so well. I think that the song was made just so that the band could play a cool 7/8 groove because when I listen to the rest of the album this song is very repetitive comparatively. It's just the same baseline and vocals transposed around three or so times, and they didn't even bother to write words for it. Normally I might have chosen a different song by this band but having just learned the word "Vocable" it felt very appropriate...
Once again the amount of influence that African music has on the somewhere as far as New York is amazing. I mean I'm aware that we have taken many aspects of African music within many different genres it is still cool to really see it.
ReplyDeleteI like how you were able to link salsa to the African drumming we learned about in class. I also liked learning about clave rhythms; I had heard of them before but didn’t really know what they were.
ReplyDeleteI always thought it would be cool to learn Salsa dancing. I appreciate how heavy the presence of the clave is in Salsa music, it's something I've thought was really cool for a while but never knew the origins or its complexities.
ReplyDeleteI think it's super interesting how different cultures affected different aspects of the genre. You explained the clave rhythms really well!
ReplyDeleteSalsa is such a cool genre! I love how fun and interesting the style is. It's really cool to see the link between the rhythms in African drumming and in the Clave rhythm. I thought you explained that really well!
ReplyDeleteI always enjoy some salsa. It gets the blood flowing. I have realized through the past year how similar it is to African drumming and how it all ties together. I never knew how complex the correlation was though.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading this, and I liked how detailed you were about things I also didn't realize how complex it was. I like how you included visual representations of what you were talking about.
ReplyDelete