Music, Race, and Nation: Musica Tropical in Colombia

by Peter Wade

Long a favorite on dance floors in Latin America, the porro, cumbia, and vallenato styles that make up Colombia's música tropical are now enjoying international success. How did this music—which has its roots in a black, marginal region of the country—manage, from the 1940s onward, to become so popular in a nation that had prided itself on its white heritage? Peter Wade explores the history of música tropical , analyzing its rise in the context of the development of the broadcast media, rapid urbanization, and regional struggles for power. Using archival sources and oral histories, Wade shows how big band renditions of cumbia and porro in the 1940s and 1950s suggested both old traditions and new liberties, especially for women, speaking to a deeply rooted image of black music as sensuous. Recently, nostalgic, "whitened" versions of música tropical have gained popularity as part of government-sponsored multiculturalism.

Wade's fresh look at the way music transforms and is transformed by ideologies of race, nation, sexuality, tradition, and modernity is the first book-length study of Colombian popular music.

331 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2000

Reviews

[Camilo Mazuera · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tenía ganas de leer este libro desde hace mucho porque lo recomendaban. Es un libro académico sobre la construcción de una identidad nacional colombiana a partir de la música tropical o costeña. El autor hace un recorrido muy juicioso y creo que, en general, es un muy buen texto académico. También es un buen documento para aprender sobre la música de nuestro país.

[Yago · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a Colombian having emigrated at a young age, this book was fascinating. A way to learn the how and why of a part of our identity.