The most adventurous production out of Cuba of late is a revisionist take on the venerable rumba. At the MIDEM conference in Cannes last month, producer Cary Diez of the Havana label BIS Music ...

If you love the wonderful beat of merengue music or the sounds of Cuban rumba, you'll be happy to know they're considered worldwide cultural treasures. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and ...

Even after nine years away from the U.S., Cuban rumba music and dance group Los Munequitos de Matanzas is inspiring a level of fan loyalty on its current U.S. tour similar to The Grateful Dead’s.

Okuté are an ensemble from Havana, Cuba who — to quote their bio — are “putting the spotlight on the sound of 1960s Cuba with a contemporary spirit.” Their self-titled debut album comes out June 4 via ...

The death of Cuban conga master Carlos "Patato" Valdes this past December provides a sad opportunity to dig out one of his best-known recordings — which also happens to be a groundbreaking piece of ...

Earlier this year, I sang the praises of the debut full-length album by the group ÌFÉ, a dramatic meditation on traditional Afro-Cuban rumba and santeria music. After seeing the band live in ...

If there is one film that can serve as a metaphor for how little the world knows about Cuba, Latin America, and the rest of the region, it’s "The Forbidden Shore," a marvelous documentary that ...

Let me make the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws. —Andrew Fletcher, 1703. In the politically violent land of Cuba there is often some doubt as to who, exactly, is writing the laws.

The Bay Area has been a hotbed for Cuban music for more than half a century, and despite the persistent cold war freeze on relations with the communist-ruled nation, the temperature here keeps rising.

Ever since 1875 when Emperor Franz Josef shook his royal britches to the tune of the Afro-Cuban habanera, the world has imported a remarkably large part of its popular music from Cuba. But only in ...