“This is a love story that begins one night in September 2019. The drums, long before you see them, are heard on the horizon.”
This is how the Uruguayan singer-songwriter Jorge Drexler recalled on Tuesday in Madrid his first meeting with the cadombe comparsa La Melaza, a group made up exclusively of women who impregnated with their percussion the International Day of African Culture organized by the Ibero-American General Secretariat and the Casa de America.
The event wanted to underline the contribution of Afro-descendants to the Ibero-American identity and highlight that music can also be a boost for diversity and the rights of women and Afro-descendants.
The Uruguayan candombe, declared by Unesco in 2009 Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, has its origin in African slaves and is part of the cultural identity of the South American country, although it is also present in Argentina and Paraguay.
"I was used to seeing the boys playing the drum and suddenly I see a group of women and dissidents, a mixture of Amazons, warriors and muses," Drexler continued to recall when introducing the comparsa.
The musician is one of the Ibero-American ambassadors of Culture appointed by the SEGIB to promote the values of solidarity, plurality and respect for the diversity of Ibero-America.
“For years it has been the men who went to the comparsas to do candombe.
So we have had to earn this space (...) Women are exposed to machismo, racism and poverty inherited from the colony, that is why the rhythms of resistance are essential to make the fight visible”, assured Fernanda Bertola, a member from La Melaza, who defines herself as a transfeminist and anti-racist.
For these musicians, emphasizing the female role in the conservation of African culture is a priority: "Women are the ones who transmit these inheritances, they maternity, raise and tell the story of their grandparents," says the teacher of introduction to candombe in Uruguay, Paola Correa Ramos.
Self denial and racism
According to UN figures, in the American continent - not including the English-speaking Caribbean - there are 200 million people who self-identify as Afro-descendants, although the real figures would be much higher.
"This difference has to do with the role of the State and with the historical weight of racism and discrimination, which has given rise to denial and, even worse, self-denial," according to the institution.
For its part, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (CEPAL) has considered that the Afro-descendant heritage has become "invisible" in the region and that this has made it unknown "the contribution of black culture to the development of nations and denying them pride in their heritage in societies, hiding and perpetuating racial inequalities and secular racism.”
The Afro-Peruvian singer and musicologist Mariella Köhn, also present at the meeting, admitted that from a very young age she has wondered about her identity and about the origin of the surname Bailón, inherited from her mother.
“I discovered that my African roots come from the Congo.
And that it doesn't matter if you are Afro-Peruvian, or Afro-Cuban... or from any other country because history has divided us, they have dismembered all of us out there.
But then, through music, we've managed to stick together,” she opined.
The Uruguayan troupe La Melaza at the Gabriela Mistral Amphitheater at Casa de América. On loan from Casa de América
That is why for Köhn, who explores the African roots in the music of his country, finding identity, from the origin and through the miscegenation, is essential to understand what unites Africa, America and Spain.
“I am Blanquinegrindian,” she declared before the more than 250 people gathered at the Casa de América in Madrid.
In the same act, Enrique Ojeda Vila, general director of Casa de América, highlighted the power of art and culture inherited from Africa as a tool of resistance.
“Music and dance are instruments in favor of identity, cultural diversity and the claim of rights”, he pointed out.
The candombe drums engulfed those present at this meeting.
Also the drawer, the box and the guitar of Afro-Peruvian music.
“This little wooden box is a salt cellar adapted to make good music.
Our black ancestors didn't have the instruments, but they were full of rhythm and wit,” Köhn explained.
The Peruvian musicologist ended her intervention with the poem "They yelled at me black", by the Lima composer Victoria Eugenia Santa Cruz Gamarra.
“I finally understood.
I don't back down anymore.
And I advance safely, I advance and wait.
And I bless heaven, because God wanted jet black to be my color."
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