Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-18T05:26:17.476Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The ‘routes’ and ‘roots’ of danzón: a critique of the history of a genre

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2011

Hettie Malcomson
Hettie Malcomson
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, PPSIS, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this article, I examine the history of a genre that spans several continents and several centuries. I bring together material from Mexico, Cuba, France and the UK to create anew, expand upon and critique the ‘standard’ histories of danzón narrated by Mexico's danzón experts (and others). In these ‘standard’ histories, origins and nationality are key to the constitution of genres which are racialised and moralised for political ends. Danzón, its antecedents and successors are treated as generic equivalents despite being quite different. From the danzón on, these genres are positioned as being the products of individual, male originators (and their nations). ‘Africa’ is treated as a conceptual nation, and ‘Africanness’ as something extra which racialises hegemonic European music-dance forms. Political leanings and strategies determine whether these music-dance forms are interpreted, adopted or co-opted as being ‘black’ or ‘white’.

Type
Articles
Information
Popular Music , Volume 30 , Special Issue 2: Crossing Borders: Music of Latin America , May 2011 , pp. 263 - 278
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Acosta, L. 2004. Otra Visión de la Música Popular Cubana (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubana)Google Scholar
Alén Rodríguez, O. 1998. ‘Cuba’, in The Garland Encyclopaedia of World Music: vol. 2, South America, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean, ed. Olsen, D.A. and Sheehy, D.E. (New York and London, Garland Publishers), pp. 822–39Google Scholar
Argyriadis, K. 2006. ‘Les batá deux fois sacrés. La construction de la tradition musicale et chorégraphique Afro-Cubaine’, Civilisations, LII, pp. 45–74Google Scholar
Balbuena, B. 2003. El Casino y la Salsa en Cuba (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Becker, H.S. 1982. Art Worlds (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, University of California Press)Google Scholar
Carpentier, A. 1946. La Música en Cuba (México, Fondo de Cultura Economica)Google Scholar
Castillo Faílde, O. 1964. Miguel Faílde, Creador Musical del Danzón (La Habana, Editorial Consejo Nacional de Cultura)Google Scholar
Chasteen, J.C. 2004. National Rhythms, African Roots: The Deep History of Latin American Popular Dance (Albuquerque, University of New Mexico Press)Google Scholar
Chomsky, A., Carr, B., and Smorkaloff, P.M. (eds.) 2003. The Cuba Reader: History, Culture, Politics (Durham and London, Duke University Press)Google Scholar
Clifford, J. 1994. ‘Diasporas’, Cultural Anthropology, 9, pp. 302–38Google Scholar
Fernández, M.A. 1974. Bailes Populares Cubanos (La Habana, Editorial Pueblo y Educación)Google Scholar
Fernández, N. 1989. ‘La contradanza Cubana y Manuel Saumell’, Latin American Music Review [Revista de Música Latinoamericana], 10, pp. 116–34Google Scholar
Floyd, S.A. Jr. 1999. ‘Black music in the Circum-Caribbean’, American Music, 17, pp. 1–38Google Scholar
Frith, S. 1996. Performing Rites: On the Value of Popular Music (Cambridge, Harvard University Press)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gadles Mikowsky, S. 1988. Ignacio Cervantes y la Danza en Cuba (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Galán, N. 1983. Cuba y sus Sones (Madrid, Pre-Textos)Google Scholar
Gilroy, P. 1991. ‘Sounds authentic: Black music, ethnicity, and the challenge of a “changing“ same’, Black Music Research Journal, 11, pp. 111–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilroy, P. 1993. The Black Atlantic: Double Consciousness and Modernity (Cambridge, Harvard University Press)Google Scholar
González, H. (ed.) 1980. Manuel Saumell: Contradanzas (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Grenet, E. 1939. Popular Cuban Music: Eighty Revised and Corrected Compositions Together with an Essay on the Evolution of Music in Cuba (Havana, Ministerio de Educación, Dirección de Cultura)Google Scholar
Guilcher, J.-M. 1969. La Contredanse et les Renouvellements de la Danse Française (Paris and The Hague, Mouton & Co.)Google Scholar
Hennion, A. 1982. ‘Popular music as social production’, in Popular Music Perspectives 1, ed. Horn, D. and Tagg, P. (Gothenberg and Exeter, IASPM), pp. 32–40Google Scholar
Jones (Amiri Baraka), L. 1966. ‘The changing same (R&B and new Black music)’, in Black Music (New York, Morrow), pp. 180–211Google Scholar
Lapique, Z. 1995. ‘Aportes franco-haitianos a la contradanza cubana: mitos y realidades’, in Panorama de la Música Popular Cubana, ed. Giro, R. (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas), pp. 137–54Google Scholar
León, A. 1976. ‘De la contradanza al danzón’, in Música Folklore: Danzón, ed. León, A. and Urfé, O. (La Habana, Consejo Nacional de Cultura)Google Scholar
León, A. 1984. Del Canto y el Tiempo (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
León, A. 1991. ‘Notes toward a panorama of popular and folk musics’, in Essays on Cuban Music: North American and Cuban Perspectives, ed. Manuel, P. (Lanham, University Press of America), pp. 3–23Google Scholar
Lomnitz Adler, C. 2001. ‘Nationalism as a practical system: Benedict Anderson's theory of nationalism from the vantage point of Spanish America’, in The Other Mirror. Grand Theory Through the Lens of Latin America, ed. Centeno, M.A. and López Alves, F. (Princeton, Princeton University Press), pp. 329–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martínez, M.A. 1993. Cubanos en la Música (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Martínez Furé, R. 1991. ‘Tambor (drum)’, in Essays on Cuban Music: North American and Cuban Perspectives, ed. Manuel, P. (Lanham, University Press of America), pp. 27–50Google Scholar
Martínez Rodríguez, R., undated. El Danzón Cuenta su Historia (Matanzas, Impreso Divulgación Provincial de Cultura)Google Scholar
Matory, J.L. 1999. ‘Afro-Atlantic culture: on the live dialogue between Africa and the Americas’, in Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, ed. Appiah, K.A. and Gates, H.L. Jr. (New York, Basic Civitas Books)Google Scholar
Moore, R.D. 1997. Nationalizing Blackness: Afrocubanismo and Artistic Revolution in Havana, 1920–1940 (Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press)Google Scholar
Moore, R.D. 2006. Music and Revolution: Cultural Change in Socialist Cuba (Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nayak, A. 2007. ‘Critical whiteness studies’, Sociology Compass, 1, pp. 737–55Google Scholar
Neale, S. 1980. Genre (London, British Film Institute)Google Scholar
Negus, K. 1999. Music Genres and Corporate Cultures (London and New York, Routledge)Google Scholar
Orovio, H. 1981 Diccionario de la Música Cubana (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Orovio, H. 1994. El Danzón, el Mambo y el Chachachá (Santiago de Cuba, Editorial Oriente)Google Scholar
Ortíz, F. 1950. La Africanía de la Música Folklórica de Cuba (La Habana, Dirección de Cultura, Ministerio de Educación)Google Scholar
Ortíz, F. 1981 [1951]. Los Bailes y el Teatro de los Negros en el Folklore de Cuba (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas)Google Scholar
Padura Fuentes, L. 1994. ‘Cachao: mi idioma es un contrabajo’, Gaceta de Cuba, 32, pp. 42–5Google Scholar
Pichardo, D.E. 1953 [1836]. Pichardo Novisimo o Diccionario Provincial Casi Razonado de Vozes y Frases Cubanas (La Habana, Editorial O'Reilly)Google Scholar
Playford, J. 1698 [1651]. The Dancing Master; Or, Directions for Dancing Country Dances, with the Tunes to each Dance, for the Treble-Violin. The Tenth Edition Corrected; With the Addition of Several New Dances and Tunes Never Before Printed (London, printed by J. Heptinstall for H. Playford)Google Scholar
Quirey, B. 1993. May I Have the Pleasure? The Story of Popular Dancing (London, Dance Books)Google Scholar
Rodríguez Domínguez, E. 1967. Iconografía del Danzón (La Habana, Subdirección Provincial de Música de La Habana)Google Scholar
Sachs, C. 1937. World History of the Dance (New York, W.W. Norton)Google Scholar
Samson, J. ‘Genre’, Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy, http://www.grovemusic.com (accessed 20 May 2009)Google Scholar
Samson, J. 1989. ‘Chopin and genre’, Music Analysis, 8, pp. 213–31Google Scholar
Sánchez de Fuentes, E. 1928. Folklorismo (La Habana, Molina)Google Scholar
Savigliano, M.E. 1995. Tango and the Political Economy of Passion (Boulder, Westview Press)Google Scholar
Tagg, P. 1989. ‘“Black Music”, “Afro-American Music” and “European Music”’, Popular Music, 8, pp. 285–98Google Scholar
Torres, D.I. 1995. ‘Del danzón cantado al chachachá’, in Panorama de la Música Popular Cubana, ed. Giro, R. (La Habana, Editorial Letras Cubanas), pp. 171–97Google Scholar
Urfé, O. 1965. Anotaciones sobre Música Popular (La Habana, E.I.A.)Google Scholar
Urfé, O. 1976. ‘Síntesis histórica del danzón’, in Música Folklore: Danzón, ed. León, A. and Urfé, O. (La Habana, Consejo National de Cultura)Google Scholar
Urfé, O. 1979. Centenario del Danzón (La Habana, Organización Técnica Nefertiti Tellería. Ministerio de Cultura)Google Scholar
Villaverde, C. 1974 [1882]. Cecilia Valdés o La Loma del Angel (La Habana, Ediciones Huracán)Google Scholar
Wade, P. 2000. Music, Race and Nation: Música Tropical in Colombia (Chicago and London, University of Chicago Press)Google Scholar
Wade, P. 2001. ‘Racial identity and nationalism: a theoretical view from Latin America’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 24, pp. 845–65CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Washabaugh, W. 1996. Flamenco: Passion, Politics and Popular Culture (Oxford and Washington, Berg)Google Scholar
Whitlock, K. 1999. ‘John Playford's The English Dancing Master 1650/51 as cultural politics’, Folk Music Journal, 7, pp. 548–78Google Scholar
Wolff, J. 1981. The Social Production of Art (London, Macmillan)CrossRefGoogle Scholar