a Seeped Into Latin Music
Note: This piece is better heard than read. For examples of the music and a drumming demonstration, listen at the audio link. www.fashionshoes.us.com
If you wanted to put it in extremely simple terms, you could call Santera a mashup of mythology from west and central Africa and Christianity. Santera ceremonies are for calling out to the spiritual world, and that spiritual connection is made through music.
At his home studio in Oakland, Calif., percussionist and bandleader John Santos sets up a trio of bat drums, the hourglass shaped drums traditionally used in Santera ceremonies, and explains where their unique sound comes from.
Hear The Music
Listen to a concert that's also a Santera ceremony, recorded live at Lincoln Center in New York. Black Python Alfredo
Jazz Night In America
Behind Wynton Marsalis' Afro Cuban 'Ochas' Suite Black Leather Atalanta
The sacred and the secular have shared a place in Cuban music going back to the 19th century and, in fact, sacred music with roots in west Africa informs a lot of Cuban popular music.
Santos says that for many practitioners of Santera and the musicians who draw on those traditions for inspiration, the intricate and subtle, interlocking rhythms, as well as the haunting and profound melodies of the chants and ceremonial music, reflect an emotional and musical power that remind us that there is something greater than ourselves. Black Patent Leather Alfredo
"When you put them together, they create a weave of rhythm that is absolutely magical and irresistible," he says. "You cannot listen to that music and stay still. It's music that just moves you from the inside out."