Sources
The “origin story” of Los Brujos de Limones included in “The Legend of Choncholí” is largely based on the work of Ada Ferrer and Judith Bettelheim. Bettelheim is the only author to include the raid on Limónes, Los Brujos, Moncada and Choncholí in her narrative. She mentions that five different informants told her versions of this story, a fact that substantiates its prominence in local memory at the time of her fieldwork. Most texts present some but not all of these aspects of the story, emphasizing the connection between Moncada and Los Hoyos.
TvSantiago's Los Hoyos más allá de su conga: herencia y raíz--parte de nuestra nacionalidad (Los Hoyos Beyond the Conga: Heritage and Roots--Part of our National Identity), which includes an account of "Choncholí," is a great example of how Los Hoyos is incorporated into official nation building narratives:
Para hablar de raíces afro-cubanas, se localiza el barrio de Los Hoyos en esta ciudad, donde se escuchan leyendas increíbles, historias de hombres bravíos y nacimientos de grupos y ritmos que caracterizan a la cultura santiaguera. Es una voz autorizada de los ancestros.
When discussing Afro-Cuban roots, we recognize this city's Los Hoyos neighborhood, where we hear about incredible legends, stories of brave men and births of groups and rhythms that charecterize Santiago’s culture. It is an authorized voice of the ancestors.
The article concludes:
Vale hablar de los Hoyos, al decir de Fernando Ortiz, allí se mezcla todo, como un gran ajiaco, un paradigma vivo de nuestra idiosincrasia y nacionalidad.
As Fernando Ortiz would say, Los Hoyos is a like great stew where everything is mixed together--a living paradigm of our ideosyncracies and national identity.
My account of the PIC and the events of 1912 draws on AfroCubaWeb and the work of Historian Aline Helg, Mililian Galis and Fernando Ortiz.
Andrés Cobas is the only person I know who describes "Choncholí's" use in a religous context. This practice came up when I asked him if Choncholí was performed in folkloric settings; I was actually thinking of staged tajona performances and not Bembé. Bembé de Sao and its music have not been documented nearly as much as other Afro-Cuban religious systems such as Regla de Ocha (Santeria) and Palo.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to everyone who generously shared their memories, wisdom, and experience with me:
Muchisimas gracias a todos que han compartido sus memorias sabiduria, y experiencia:
Berta Armiñan Linares: master singer and dancer, co-founder of Conjunto Folklorico de Oriente and former member of Ballet Folklorico Cutumba.
Lazaro Bandera Malet: musical director of La Conga de Los Hoyos, master musican and historian of La Conga; star of Lazaro and the Shark.
Felix Bandera Blas: director of La Conga de Los Hoyos, staunch defender of The Conga and its deep-rooted traditions.
Andres Cobas Martens: vocalist, percussionist and corneta china player in Conga Paso Franco.
Rubestier Porte: vocalist, poet, musican, composer; co-star of Lazaro and the Shark and a viral clip about scarcity in Cuba.
Ricardo Velazquez: director, Conga El Guayabito.
Special thanks to everyone who generously shared their memories, wisdom, and experience with me:
Muchisimas gracias a todos que han compartido sus memorias sabiduria, y experiencia:
Berta Armiñan Linares: master singer and dancer, co-founder of Conjunto Folklorico de Oriente and former member of Ballet Folklorico Cutumba.
Lazaro Bandera Malet: musical director of La Conga de Los Hoyos, master musican and historian of La Conga; star of Lazaro and the Shark.
Felix Bandera Blas: director of La Conga de Los Hoyos, staunch defender of The Conga and its deep-rooted traditions.
Andres Cobas Martens: vocalist, percussionist and corneta china player in Conga Paso Franco.
Rubestier Porte: vocalist, poet, musican, composer; co-star of Lazaro and the Shark and a viral clip about scarcity in Cuba.
Ricardo Velazquez: director, Conga El Guayabito.
| bibliography.pdf |
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Armiñan Linares, Berta. Personal interview. 3 December 2019
Bandera, Lázaro. Personal interviews. 25 April 2022 and 24 November 2022.
Bandera, Felix. Personal interview. 2022. 3 June 2019.
Bettelheim, Judith. “Carnival in Santiago de Cuba.” Cuban Festivals: A Century of Afro-Cuban
Culture, edited by Judith Bettelheim. Kingston, Ian Randle Publishers, 2001, pp 94-126.
Brea, Rafael. “Santiago de Cuba: Carnaval y guerras de independencia (Siglo XIX) [Santiago De Cuba: Carnival and the
Wars of Independence (19th Century)]” Batey: Revista Cubana de Antropología Sociocultural, vol. 3, no. 3, 2013, pp.
98—113.
Castro, Fidel. Discurso Pronunciado Por El Commandante En Jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, Primer Secretario Del Comité
Central Del Partido Comunista De Cuba Y Presidente De Los Consejos De Estado Y De Ministros, Al Recibir La Llave De La Ciudad, En El Palacio De La Intendencia [Speech by Commander in Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Councils of State and Ministries, upon Receiving the Key to the City in the Palace of the Administration]. http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/1968/esp/f101068e.html. Accessed 5 May 2022.
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Conga Santiaguera - Historia de La Salsa En Argentina. http://www.americasalsa.com/lamusica/conga_santiaguera.html.
Accessed 21 Nov. 2022.
del Carmen, Maria, et al. Foco Cultural Conga Los Hoyos “El Cocoyé” [Conga Los Hoyos (“El Cocoyé”) and its Clubhouse].
21 July 2006, https://web.archive.org/web/20060721084347/http://cultstgo.cult.cu/municipios/santiago
/los_hoyos.html. Accessed 21 Nov. 2022.
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Esta Es La Conga [This is the Conga]. Directed by combati, 2008. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVpVvU2Hsd4.
Ferrer, Ada. Insurgent Cuba: Race, Nation, and Revolution, 1868-1898. Univ of North Carolina Press, 2005.
Galis Riverí, Mililian. La percusión en los ritmos afrocubanos y haitiano-cubanos [Percussion in Afro-Cuban and Haitian-
Cuban Rhythms]. Santiago de Cuba, Ediciones Caserón, 2015.
González, Pablo Alonso. Cuban Cultural Heritage: A Rebel Past for a Revolutionary Nation. University Press of Florida,
2018. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvx07534.
Hernández, Yelanys. “La Conga de Los Hoyos arribó a sus 108 años” [La Conga de Los Hoyos at Age 108]. Juventud Rebelde [Rebel Youth], 31 July 2010, https://www.juventudrebelde.cu/cultura/2010-07-31/la-conga-de-los-hoyos-arribo-a-sus-108-anos.Accessed 23 March 2022.
La Conga Santiaguera: Voice of Resistance. Directed by combati, 2011. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JjVW-RYd-c.
López, María Elena. “La Invasión de los Hoyos, homenaje a la epopeya mambisa” [The Invasion from Los Hoyos: Homage to the Mambí (Guerilla) Legend]. Tv Santiago, 11 July 2019, https://www.tvsantiago.icrt.cu/2019/07/la-invasion-de-los-hoyos-homenaje-a-la-epopeya-mambisa. Accessed 3 December 2022.
— — —. “Los Hoyos más allá de su conga: herencia y raíz-parte de nuestra nacionalidad” [Los Hoyos Beyond the Conga: Heritage and Roots, Part of Our Nationality].” Tvsantiago, 8 December 2018, https://www.tvsantiago.icrt.cu/2018/12/los-hoyos-mas-alla-de-su-conga-herencia-y-raiz-parte-de-nuestra-nacionalidad. Accessed 3 December 2022.
Luis, William. “Editor’s Note.” Afro - Hispanic Review, vol. 36, no. 1, 2017, pp. 5–10.
Miller, Nicola. “The Absolution of History: Uses of the Past in Castro’s Cuba.” Journal of Contemporary History, vol.
38, no. 1, 2003, pp. 147–62.
Millet, José, et al. Barrio, comparsa y carnaval santiaguero [Neighborhood, Comparsa, and Carnival in Santiago].
Santiago de Cuba, Ediciones Casa del Caribe, 1997.
Millet, José, and Rafael Brea. Grupos folklóricos de Santiago de Cuba [Folkloric Groups in Santiago de Cuba]. Santiago
de Cuba: Editorial Oriente, 1989.
Milstein, Lani. “Toward an Understanding of ‘Conga Santiaguera’: Elements of ‘La Conga de Los Hoyos.’” Latin
American Music Review / Revista de Música Latinoamericana, vol. 34, no. 2, University of Texas Press, 2013, pp.
223–53, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43282555.
— — —. “La Conga.” ReVista, 2014, https://revista.drclas.harvard.edu/la-conga/.
Ortiz, Fernando. Los bailes y el teatro de los negros en el folklore de Cuba [Black Dance and Theatre in Cuban Folklore].
Ministerio De Educación, Dirección De Cultura 1951.
Palma, Odal. 2006. Más vale tarde que nunca. Revista de Cultura Cubana, La Jiribilla. Año V, La Habana. 20- 26 de
Mayo.
Pérez, Louis A. The Structure of Cuban History: Meanings and Purpose of the Past. The University of North Carolina Press,
2013, https://doi.org/10.5149/9781469608860_perez.
Perez Sarduy, Pedro. Liner notes. Conga De Los Hoyos. Carnival Music Of Eastern Cuba. CD, World Audio Foundation,
2009.
Quinn, Kate. “Cuban Historiography in the 1960s: Revisionists, Revolutionaries and the Nationalist Past.” Bulletin of
Latin American Research, vol. 26, no. 3, 2007, pp. 378–98.
Routon, Kenneth. “Conjuring the Past: Slavery and the Historical Imagination in Cuba.” American Ethnologist, vol. 35,
no. 4, 2008, pp. 632–49. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/27667516. Accessed 4 Dec. 2022.
The 1912 Massacre. https://www.afrocubaweb.com/history/eldoce.htm. Accessed 15 Dec. 2022.
Velásquez Serrano, Ricardo. Personal interview. December 1 2019.
150 Años de Lucha [150 Years of struggle]. 2018. https://www.juventudrebelde.cu/especiales/150aniversario-guerra-independencia-cuba/index.html. Accessed 21 Nov. 2022.
