congaplace.com

I'm looking for a good, very substantive, college-level-style book on the history of Cuban music and the instruments use.

Does anybody have any recommendations? If you had 2 books to recommend only...which ones would they be?

http://www.amazon.com/Cuba-Its-Music-Fi ... 1556525168

http://www.amazon.com/Afro-Cuban-Rhythm ... 060&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Rumba-Social-Chan ... 94&sr=1-11


The first one has been recommended to me, I've flipped though it at the store, looks good, just have not
bought it yet.

I've read the second, really good, it has sections on Mongo, Armando and Francisco. Discusses the migrations of the Carribean islands and how it influences and explains the popularity of Cuban music.

I have also read the third one, more modern history but very good, focuses a bit on dance, but there is a lot of information on the music and drums. I really liked this one too.

Firebrand,
Here's a substantive, college-level article by Nolan Warden on the history of the conga drum. It has more info on the drum than the recommended books.

http://www.nolanwarden.com/Conga_Drum_History(Warden).pdf

Sublet's book is a great overview.
-David

Thanks David but the link is broken !

Laurent Lamy wrote:Thanks David but the link is broken !

http://www.nolanwarden.com/info.html

Nolan asks not to repost without permission, I think that prevents linking directly to the article??

In the beginning of Poncho Sanchez' "Conga cookbook" they have reproduced a good 7 page article on history of tumbadoras by Cuban musicologist Olavo Alen Rodriguez.

I can recommend Ned Sublette's book, too. It does not go very deep in instruments, but it's a good general history of music that is nicely interwoven with history of Cuba, a very interesting read. The DVD "Roots of rhythm" that was recommended in another thread nicely complements it visually (but of course lacks the breadth of book, you can only show so much even if the film is 3 hours long)

korman wrote:In the beginning of Poncho Sanchez' "Conga cookbook" they have reproduced a good 7 page article on history of tumbadoras by Cuban musicologist Olavo Alen Rodriguez.

I think Afrocuba web has that article available here..

http://www.afrocubaweb.com/cidmuc.htm

I can't say for sure it is the same article as I don't have Pancho's book, it's a gppd article, an excerpt from his book
Atlas of the Folkloric-Popular Instruments of Cuba, which I guess is also available from Afrocuba web for $200!.

bongosnotbombs wrote:I can't say for sure it is the same article as I don't have Pancho's book

Yes, it's the same article! I did not know it was available there for free:)

Thanks David but the link is broken !

It was just the hyperlink (the part in blue) if you copy and paste the whole line (including the ").pdf") it will work. Here it is again:

http://www.nolanwarden.com/Conga_Drum_History(Warden).pdf

Nolan asks not to repost without permission, I think that prevents linking directly to the article??

I'm pretty sure just linking directly to an article is not considered reposting. Reposting would occur when, for example, someone downloads the pdf from Nolan's server then hosts it on their own server, and links to that one. Or copying all the text and putting it on another website in html format.

saludos!
Barry