My Peru diary - day 15 (all about the BIG SHOOT)

Peru diary (Dec. 19, 2014)

Well, yesterday was the BIG SHOOT, the reason that I scheduled my trip when I did, so that I could get all three great percussionists together:  Lalo Izquierdo, Juan Medrano Cotito, and Huevito Lobatón.

We filmed the conversation part in "my apartment."  l to r:  Cotito, Huevito Lobatón and Lalo Izquierdo.

And they were, well, great!

We started off by filming a conversation between the three of them, in which I presented three topics and asked them simply to talk about them.  The first topic was...how did they learn Afro-Peruvian rhythms.  Of course, I knew they had all learned as kids in their homes, watching parents, family, and friends but I wanted them to talk about this in front of the camera.

They did, indeed, talk.  After an hour on the topic, I had to raise my hand and ask them to stop since I was running out of film.  (I still shoot with videotape, although the other two camera people had video cards.)

Me with Huevito Lobatón.  We filmed the interviews in a park in Barranco (another district of Lima).

What they said as they talked was really fun and interesting.  I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

Because of the time factor, we had to skip topic two, and I had them move briefly through topic three (what they think is the future of Afro-Peruvian music, rhythms and dance).

Next, we filmed short interviews in which I asked each of them separately a very few questions.

Lalo Izquierdo and Juan Medrano Cotito in the park.

Finally, the big thing:  the performance part.  We filmed this in a cultural organization which has a stage and puts on performances.  It's called Casa Shenan.

They did four numbers:  one with just the three of them playing cajón and singing;  one with Lalo Izquierdo and Huevito Lobatón performing zapateo footwork (with a guitar accompanying them) and two with a guitar, a singer, and the three of them playing percussion - cajón and some quijada de burro.

In Casa Shenan, setting up for the performance part.

It was really great.  In fact, I've decided I'll use this material (supplemented by other things I shot in Peru) to make a documentary called Masters of Percussion...because they really are, and all three are fascinating people.

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I am in Peru for reasons related to our documentary, A Zest for Life, and other work about Afro-Peruvians.

(For more photos, go to the Facebook page of Palomino Productions, A Zest for Life Afro-Peruvian, and Eve A. Ma.)

Lalo Izquierdo in Peru: an interview & a cajón demonstration

Yesterday (Dec 8, 2014) we filmed an interview and cajón demonstration with Lalo Izquierdo in the patio of the apartment where I'm staying in Lima, Peru. "We" means me and a camera operator/all around assistant. He will remain nameless because the quality of his work was kind of mediocre.

On the whole, things went fine and I think I know how to fix a few of the little problems that cropped up with the image. But life is full of little bumps in the road, right?

Lalo Izquierdo (right) and me.  A bit of a contrast, right?

Our first bump came when Lalo couldn't find the apartment. Lima is a big city, and when I say I'm staying in Lima, I really mean I'm staying in greater Lima, in the Lima metropolitan area.

My particular section is called Miraflores, and the apartment is on a short street named la Libertad. I called Lalo on his cell phone 15 minutes after he was due, and found out he was wandering around, looking for the street. I passed the phone over to the camera operator who explained to Lalo how to get here. Twenty minutes later, I got a call from Lalo...he was still wandering around.  Lost.

The upper half of "my" short street, la Libertad.

In the end I had to send the camera operator out to find him and guide him over here.

Next problem: I was short one camera battery. (We were filming with three of my cameras, using two different formats). That was solved when we found an electrical outlet close enough for one of the cameras to use.

Starting to set up.

After overcoming several other little problems, we obtained a fairly decent image and good sound for two separate interviews (one for each format) and two separate cajón demonstrations, plus shots of Lalo and me walking down the street. 

What we missed, which is important, is a second interview to be conducted in Sucro with an elderly woman (wife of a deceased Afro-Peruvian percussionist great, Ronaldo Campos). With the problems of Lalo getting lost and the time it took to film everything in Miraflores, she had gone out.

Lalo on set with the cajón.

We'll catch her another day.

And the problems with the camera operator? He doesn't know how to zoom, and the only idea he has of filming an interview is to point the camera towards the people to be filmed and punch the "record" button.

SIGH!

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We are working on making a few revisions in our documentary film, A Zest for Life: Afro-Peruvian Rhythms, a Source of Latin Jazz, and shooting a trailer for a new, more comprehensive work about Afro-Peruvian music and the Afro-Peruvian community.

P.S.  Thanks to María del Carment López Quispe for help with some of my makeup.

National Afro-Peruvian Museum in Lima, Peru

After decades and decades of neglect, the government of Peru finally decided to recognize and salute the African descendants that form perhaps as high as 10 percent of its population.  An important element in this recognition was the creation of the Museo Nacional Afroperuanos (National Museum of the Afro-Peruvian Peoples) in the capitol city of Lima.

The museum was given a fine building -- a beautiful late 18th century edifice -- as well as a budget and a director.  Under the director, the museum built up a collection of artifacts and documents related to the history of Afro-Peruvians including the two and a half centuries in which they were enslaved in Peru.

The museum also engaged in a great deal of outreach, including classes in dance, cajón, history and culture.  These classes, some directed towards adults and some intended for children, were for the most part free.  They boasted good instructors, including Lalo Izquierdo, the star of our documentary A Zest for Life:  Afro-Peruvian Rhythms, a Source of Latin Jazz, who taught many of the cajón classes.

Then, a few months ago, something happened.  I am not very conversant with Peruvian politics, so I can´t really tell you what, but I can tell you the effects.

The museum´s director, Dr. Augusto Lavala, was terminated.  No new director was hired.  The budget was either cut drastically or completely eliminated.  All the classes had to be cancelled.  And then, the government turned the administration of the museum´s building over to a government organ unrelated to Afro-Peruvian culture (the Oficina de Participación, Proyección y Enlace con el Ciudadano).

I am very, very sad to see this happen.  In any event, if you want to see the museum´s still extant web site, which gives a virtual tour of the building it no longer occupies, go HERE.  If you want to see photos from the former classes, and other evidence of what the museum used to do, go to its Facebook page, which is HERE.

One happy note:  Lalo Izquierdo and others are continuing to give classes in cajón, Afro-Peruvian dance, and more in the town of San Luis de Cañete, to help maintain the tradition.

OUR NEXT POST will be about the Centro Cultural Afroperuano San Daniel de Carboni of the predominantly Afro-Peruvian town of el Carmen, Peru.

AND AS USUAL, if you want to sign up for our newsletter, go HERE.

A Zest for Life: documentary about Afro-Peruvians

Well, we've done it.  The final version of our documentary film about Afro-Peruvians is officially out on DVD.  As you may already know, it's called A Zest for Life:  Afro-Peruvian Rhythms, a Source of Latin Jazz.  and boy are we glad it's out.

Several months ago, we gave a party to celebrate its completion and afterwards, I located some new footage which I really wanted to include.  Getting it in the proper format and with the proper permissions was a long, involved task, but I did it.

The new stuff is mainly a segment in which three famous Afro-Peruvian percussionists are sitting on the front steps of a building in the city of Zaña in Peru, improvising on the checo together.  The checo, as you surely know by now, is a percussion instrument made out of the checo gourd.

Who are these famous percussionists?  Well, there´s Hugo Bravo, who plays percussion for Susana Baca.  There´s Juan Medrano Cotito, who plays percussion for almost everyone, including Novalima.  He recently toured in the United States and I´m very, very sorry to say that I missed him.

And there´s Mangue (Manuel Vasquez Goyoneche) who, I am sad to say, recently passed away.  Below, you see him doing zapateo footwork (after the young lady, a relative, finishes), with Cotito behind him on cajón and Roberto Arguedas playing the guitar.


And when you see the three of them playing together, it is awesome.  I wish I could do that!
  
By the way, I do want to make it clear that what we´ve just brought out is the Home Use version.  We'll produce the Educational version in November.  The main difference between the two versions, other than price, is that the Educational version will have some different Extras, directed towards, well, education.

So if you want to check out our great new DVD, purchase it now at www.AZestforLifeDVD.com.  Or if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, you can go watch it in the Berkeley Video & Film Festival.  The festival runs from Dec. 7-22.  I´ll let you know the day and time of the screening for A Zest for Life once we´ve been told.

OUR NEXT POST will be a few more details about A Zest for Life.

Dance of the Devils (Son de los Diablos) part 1 of 2

As with most things in life, the more you dig down into the Son de los Diablos, the more complex you find it to be.  The more complex and also, the more interesting.

First, let's start by explaining that the Son de los Diablos is a dance and a procession or parade in which the diablos--the devils--dance down the streets (or these days, dance across the stage), accompanied by drum beats from the cajón and/or a cajita, a quijada de burro and a conga drum.  In addition, in the old days, there was also a form of harp but now a guitar is usually used instead.

The devils wear masks and also wear very colorful costumes, usually with a lot of frills and a lot of red.  There is a head devil, who is larger than the others, and then there are the littler diabolitos (little devils).

19th century watercolor by Pancho Fierro

In the watercolor, we see two devils, one with his mask lifted up.  We also see someone playing a harp and another person playing the cajita.  And one of the devils has a long whip.

You see it now as a stage production, or in festivals in certain regions of Latin America.  Traditionally, it was something that you only saw during processions down the streets in honor of a Catholic festival, the Corpus Cristi festival, which takes place in the spring (40 days after the Thursday of Semana Santa/Holy Week, which comes right before Easter).

Traditionally as well, the head devil carried a whip, and a huge book in which, it was said, he wrote down the names of all the people he was going to drag down to hell.

Most sources refer to it as something exclusively Afro-Peruvian but I have found in my investigations that it is also performed, and has been performed for generations, in certain African descendant communities in Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia and Mexico.

Here's one version of the dance, by a group called Yuyachkani.

But it does seem to have been particularly important in Peru, and so its association with Afro-Peruvians is logical.

And its origins?  Well, it developed out of the Corpus Cristi celebrations in southern Spain, mixed with the African traditions (especially Congolese traditions) of the people kidnapped and brought over to Latin America as slaves.

It began in the New World about 200 years ago.  As time passed, and particularly after the abolition of slavery in the mid-1900s, in most areas it was all but abandoned but in recent decades, relying on the memories of community elders, it is once again a living celebration.

The group Baila América performs the son de los diablos.

In the photo above, the head devil has a quijada de burro, while the two smaller devils are playing the cajita.

 Now, however, it is not confined to the Catholic celebration of Corpus Cristi.  As suggested above, you also see it in other celebrations including ones that have nothing to do with religion.  And today it is also performed as a stage show by many cultural organizations.

OUR NEXT POST will give more details about the Son de los Diablos.

5th Annual International Cajón Festival

The Fifth Annual International Cajón Festival is in progress right now in Lima, Peru.  It runs from April 10-22.  Yesterday, organizers were expecting 1,500 cajón players (of all skills) to participate in a massive -- and undoubtedly loud and upbeat -- celebration open to anyone who had a cajón was invited to this event, intended to break the record set last year.

On other days, the festival features famous cajón players including Rafael Santa Cruz, Cotito (seen briefly in our documentary, A Zest for Life--both in a photo and also playing the checo), and performers from Spain (including two flamenco performances), from Brazil, Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela as well as, of course, many from Peru.

Cotito, with cajón, checo, and other Afro-Peruvian percussion instruments.

There are also videos, lectures, conferences, music clinics, and a couple of slots set aside for the checo...and again, LOTS of cajón performance.  If you are a percussionist, this is where you should be!

The web site for the festival is here LINK, but it is in Spanish.....

Although people of all kinds (and all races) now play the Afro-Peruvian cajón, the festival is giving due attention to its origins in the Afro-Peruvian community, featuring many great Afro-Peruvian percussionists as well as plenty of focus in the talks, videos, etc., about the Afro-Peruvian origins of this instrument.

OUR NEXT POST will be about the upcoming trip to Berlin for the Black International Film Festival (where A Zest for Life will be screened).  OK--next post will be about a video of zapateo, cajon, etc. that a nice person named Kevin sent me, and the one AFTER that will be about Berlin.

Chinchivi the song-and José Alberto (Pepe) Villalobos Cavero

One of the songs on our documentary (and also on our CD de Rompe y Raja:  A Zest for Life...Afro-Peruvian Rhythms) is called le Negrito Chinchivi, or more popularly, just Chinchivi.  It's written by José Alberto (Pepe) Villalobos Cavero of Peru....




One of the pleasures of writing this blog is that I get to introduce new people -- songwriters, dancers, singers, poets and painters -- and new traditions to the north American public.

José Alberto (Pepe) Villalobos Cavero is certainly one of them who deserves to be known.  Born in  1930, he began his musical career as a child.  At the present time, he has his own musical group in Peru, called Tradición Limeña, for which he sings, and plays the cajón and the guitar.

Villalobos Cavero with his guitar.

\ Often referred to as the "king of the festejo," he is a three-time winner of the Festival of Black Music of Cañete (Peru).  Note that a festejo is a song of celebration, a party song, a lively, kick-up-your-feet and dance song.  We have several festejos on our CD and DVD, including Villalobos Cavero´s el Negrito Chinchivi, and Ritmo Negro del Perú written and performed for us by Jorge Luis Jasso.

Fiesta in the home of Jose Alberto (Pepe) Villalobos Cavero.

Villalobos Cavero is another of the major figures in Afro-Peruvian music.  He has received so many honors, we can only list a few.  He was honored in 2002 with a National Prize in Folklore.  He was honored by the city of Lima  in 2006 with a trophy for  his work in maintaining and passing on creole culture.  In 2007, he was recognized as a Master of Afro-Peruvian music.  And in 2011, the National Ministry of Culture recognized him as a "Leader in Peruvian Culture."

His song el Negrito Chinchivi is one of his most famous.  We have it on our CD de Rompe y Raja and Lalo Izquierdo:  A Zest for Life..Afro-Peruvian Rhythms LINK.  You can see it performed in the DVD of our documentary, A Zest for Life:  Afro-Peruvian Rhythms, a Source of Latin Jazz.  It´s a great song.

Villalobos Cavero singing

OUR NEXT BLOG will be about the music and dance that are called Zamacueca.

RELEASE PARTY in La Peña, Fri. Jan. 20 at 8pm

Ok, you San Francisco Bay Area residents, it's time to mark your calendars and to set the evening of Friday, Jan. 20 starting at 8pm (THIS COMING FRIDAY) for our release party.  The release party will be at la Peña Cultural Center in Berkeley (3105 Shattuck Ave.).  Cost is $15 at the door, but $12 if you purchase in advance...students and seniors get a discount.  And here's the LINK with information as to how to purchase in advance.

We've listed this event and posted photos and trailers in a number of places, including HERE.  Of course, you can also go to our web site LINK and/or to the la Peña calendar page LINK to find out more about it.

Bottom line is just that you BE there when we start the program...which will consist of the screening of the documentary, a live performance by de Rompe y Raja, the performance group featured in the documentary, and for those so inclined, a mini-lesson in Afro-Peruvian zapateo footwork.  Fun.

Juan Omar Medrano Cotito (PHOTO:  Oscar Champi Echegaray)

In the documentary, among other things you will learn about some of the percussion instruments that Afro-Peruvians have contributed to the musical world.  You see four of these in the photo above, all of which figure in one way or another in the documentary.  Those four are the Afro-Peruvian cajón, the quijada de burro, the cajita and the checo.  Each one has a very distinctive sound and if you put them all together, it´s pretty cool.

The cajita is not restricted to Afro-Peruvian music, although that's where it comes from.  Here's a percussion trio -- definitely not Afro-Peruvians (and no, the shekere is not Afro-Peruvian either, but the cajón in this video is).  Looks like they are having a good time.




SO--come out to the release party, and join us.

OUR NEXT BLOG will be about the release party, after it occurs.