Volume 11 of the OJBR presents The Downbeat Bites the Dust: Learning and Teaching Bass Grooves in Cuban Popular Music by Sarah Lahasky.
Abstract: Bass lines in Cuban popular dance music are often difficult to conceptualize from the Western classically-trained perspective due to the bass grooves' common avoidance of the downbeat. This paper analyzes these challenges of learning popular Cuban bass styles from outside of Cuba. The first section discusses the danzón, the son, and timba, three important Cuban dance music genres. By situating the styles in an historical and social context, it is easier to understand how popular Cuban bass lines have developed on the island throughout the last century. The second section provides an overview of existing method books for learning and teaching Cuban popular music to Western classically-trained bassists. It also explains pedagogical techniques and spaces of popular music training in Cuba. Through the use of both historical documentation and ethnographic data collected in Havana in June of 2018, this paper ultimately aims to provide an initial point of departure for the Western classically-trained outsider to learn and understand the role of the bass in popular Cuban dance music from afar.
It was Wednesday night at rehearsal, and the band stopped again. I lost track of the rhythmic pattern for the countless time. My fifteen years of playing bass lines in the back of the orchestra offered little transfer knowledge for the anticipated bass groove in the salsa tune that the Hispanic Caribbean ensemble was attempting to play. Why was it, I kept asking myself, that I could not seem to keep track of the downbeat in this style of music? While popular Cuban dance music genres represent a hybrid fusion of Western European and African elements (among others), the rhythmic patterns and polyrhythmic textures are more closely related to the latter (Madrid and Moore 2013: 5). Excluding some 20th and 21st century composers, Western European classical music traditionally emphasizes the downbeat, which is especially prominent in orchestral bass parts. As such, the anticipated bass style of Afro-Cuban-influenced dance tunes requires the Western classically-trained player to work against their downbeat-driven intuition and eschew beat one. Adding the intricate rhythmic layers of the clave and other percussion instruments augments the challenge of maintaining a steady groove while avoiding the downbeat.
How can a classically-trained bassist, then, break free of their tendencies from the back of the orchestra and understand the anticipated style that prevails in Afro-Cuban popular music? As bass teachers, how can we facilitate this transition for our students in a less frustrating scenario than what I describe above? This paper aims to answer these questions through historical, descriptive, and ethnographic data. Divided into two sections, the former is primarily historical and descriptive, whereas the latter relies more heavily on ethnography. The first part explores three styles of popular Cuban dance music and the role of the bass in each. Through these case studies, the first section of the paper represents a small yet significant sample of the development of the bass line in popular Cuban music over the course of the last century. I will begin with the danzón, which was one of the first widely-accepted dances in Cuba that mixed European and African elements. Along with the bassists who played and innovated the genre (namely Israel "Cachao" López and his brother, Orestes López), the danzón form and style have greatly influenced popular Cuban dance music today. I will also describe the son, which adopted certain elements from danzón and consequently diminished the popularity of the earlier dance music in the 1940s and 1950s. The son is also responsible for transforming countless other Cuban dance genres with its syncopated bass lines and improvisatory montuno sections. Lastly, I will discuss the timba, a newer genre from the last thirty years that stems primarily from rumba, son and salsa influences, in addition to other Latin American music styles. Timba bass lines represent the crux of complex rhythmic structures and virtuosic performance in popular Afro-Cuban dance music today.
In the second section, I describe the challenges of learning to play popular Cuban dance genres as a Western European classically-trained bassist, and I compare various resources for teaching and learning this style of music outside of Cuba. Using interviews from Cuban bass teachers and performers of popular music from my fieldwork in Havana in June of 2018, this section will also compare pedagogical methods of conservatories and other spaces of music learning in the United States and Cuba. Lastly, I will suggest adaptations or modifications to Western classical bass methods with the anticipated bass groove and polyrhythmic challenges of Cuban popular dance music styles in mind.
The danzón is one of the various surviving popular music styles that developed in Cuba in the 19th century. While the earliest known reference to the dance form was in 1840, the Cuban danzón peaked in popularity in the 1920s and 1930s (Madrid and Moore 2013: 3-4). Though originally danced by Afro-Cubans on the Western side of the island (particularly in Havana and the genre's birth-city of Matanzas), the danzón has a mixed history of both European and African elements. Stemming from the French contradanse, the playing style is reflective of the European classical tradition, as danzón ensembles, called orquesta típicas, generally use sheet music, which creates a relatively fixed form (Sublette 2004: 343). The danzón has included the European-derived double bass at least since its growing popularity in the early 1900s, in addition to a combination of other European string and wind instruments and African-derived percussion (4). According to Carlos del Puerto, the danzón "was one of the first typical Cuban styles which had its own rhythm and corresponding bass line" (Puerto and Vergara 1994: 1). Because of this, the danzón bass rhythm, along with that of the son tradicional, are perhaps the two most fundamental patterns that influenced most other proceeding bass lines in popular Cuban dance forms (1). The basic danzón rhythmic line consists of a two-measure cell, with the timbales playing a cinquillo1 rhythm in the first measure followed by four quarter notes (Hermida 2018a, personal communication).2 The bass line plays half notes against the cinquillo rhythm, and then a tresillo rhythm against the timbales' quarter notes.
As the danzón became popular in the 1920s and 1930s, composers and musicians such as Antonio Arcaño began experimenting with the form and style. Arcaño's band, known as Arcaño y sus Maravillas, added extended harmonies and often performed with a larger group of string instruments, usually including more violins and a cello in addition to the existing ensemble (Madrid and Moore 2013: 64-65). Arcaño's bassist, Israel "Cachao" López, along with his brother, cellist Orestes López, are credited with creating a new section in danzón called the mambo (Monroy Romero 2017: 35). This led to the up-beat, standalone genre of mambo, which some believe began with the brothers' 1938 danzón entitled "Mambo"3 ("López, Israel 'Cachao'" 2006). Additionally, Cachao experimented with "descargas," or jam sessions with more improvisation and virtuosic playing that broke away from the confines of traditional danzón accompaniment music. For example, his 1958 song entitled "Canta contrabajo" represents an unprecedented highlighting of the bass in the danzón ensemble (Puerto and Vergara 1994: 7). Cachao's descargas paved the way for more freedom for bassists in not only proceeding popular Cuban music styles, but also in various styles from the United States like jazz and funk (Sublette 2004: 451). Bassists in diverse musical groups across the Americas began treating the bass line as both a rhythmic and melodic instrument instead of continuing to outline the chordal progressions with primarily walking bass lines (451). Cachao is thus seen as a significant and influential figure of bass playing in the 20th century, and the danzón is an important piece of that development ("López, Israel 'Cachao'").
Unlike the danzón, the son developed in Oriente, on the Eastern side of the island (Moore 2010: 91). Additionally, it began as a rural style. The first manifestations of son did not include the double bass, but rather a botija4 or marimbula5 (92). After the genre's popularity grew to urban centers, the double bass replaced the other bass instruments "in an attempt to appeal to middle-class tastes and to allow for greater harmonic possibilities" (92). Sublette suggests that the first band to replace the botija with double bass was the Sexteto Habanero in 1923 (Sublette 2004: 341). The new leader of the band, Gerardo Martínez, sang and played double bass for the group (Blanco 1992: 32).6
The son is, like most Cuban dance forms, a creolized mix of African and European-derived elements. In comparison to the danzón, the son emphasizes certain African elements more apparently. For instance, performers do not use sheet music, and the songs are more improvisatory and cyclical, with built-in solo sections for particular instruments (91). One such section, the montuno section, typically includes a call-and-response from the sonero (song leader) and chorus. While the chorus is repetitive and fixed, the sonero often improvises lines, which mimics a rural style of Cuban improvisatory poetry singing known as controversias (Uribe 2006: 19). After the spread of son in Cuba, danzón composers also began adding a montuno section to their works,7 exemplifying the pervasive influence of the son in genres that came both before and after its popularization (Madrid and Moore 2013: 58). The foundational rhythmic pattern for the bass is syncopated, however unlike the syncopated cinquillo pattern of the danzón, the son bass line avoids emphasis on beat one of every measure. Also known as an anticipated bass or "tocar a'lao,"8 this groove instead emphasizes the up-beat of two and the downbeat of four.
While early son typically incorporated string instruments, percussion, and voice, a new type of son with trumpets, piano, and eventually timbales and congas became popular in the 1940s and 1950s, around the same time that the danzón was losing popularity (Moore 2010: 97-98). Referred to as conjunto, this new son style also gave rise to more elaborate syncopated bass lines, thanks to tres player and band leader Arsenio Rodríguez (100). While the prior conventional son bass lines almost exclusively played the root and fifth of the chords, Rodríguez's bass lines rose and fell with the melodic line, giving it more of a "singing" feel (García 2006: 45).9 In terms of rhythmic innovation, Rodríguez used a "claved bass" pattern, which consisted of an asymmetrical, two-measure cell that aligned with the clave instead of the repeated one-measure pattern that other composers were using at the time (Monroy Romero 2017: 26).
An important bassist to the development of son is Ignacio Piñeiro, who doubled as the band leader of the Septeto Nacional Ignacio Piñeiro, formed in 1927 (Blanco 1992: 44). The Septeto Nacional is known for mixing various other styles, such as rumba and guajira, with son clave and montuno sections (González and Casanella 2013: 362-63). This fusion of son with other genres is perhaps a result, in part, of Piñeiro's background in playing with rumba groups before leading the Septeto Nacional (Roy 2002: 132-33). Between the popularity of Rodríguez's syncopated and claved bass lines and Piñeiro's leadership and decision-making roles in the Septeto Nacional, the son became a central space for the development of bass lines in popular Cuban music in the first half of the twentieth century.
Timba is closely connected with re-recognizing Afro-Cuban social life and culture on the island after the 1959 revolution, at which time the Cuban government prohibited the celebration of any identity category (ie. race) not associated with Cuban nationalism (Perna 2013: 404). However, as Vaughan correctly cautions, "the case of timba is not a simple case of black or African resistance through music, because various sectors of Cuban society—including the state—have claims on timba as well" (2012: 9). Timba music and dance developed in Havana in the early 1990s during Cuba's "Special Period" (Perna 2013: 403). Cuba's economic stability gravely worsened with the collapse of the Soviet Union and subsequent loss of subsidized goods from that region of the world. The Cuban government was forced with the decision to end their socialist agenda and enter the neoliberal world market, or to find an alternate funding source and continue with their revolutionary visions. In an effort to save their socialist policies, the government instead decided to increase tourism, and thus nightlife, to stay afloat (403). Timba was, at least in part, a result of this decision. The term has been cited in other contexts and with other meanings at least since Fernando Ortiz's reference to timba in his 1924 Glosario de Afronegrismos, long before the music style was recognized as such (Perna 2005: 101).10 Eventually a term that young Afro-Cubans used to indicate a party, often times including rumba dancing, the name eventually denoted the newest music and dance craze on the island (Hermida 2018d, personal communication). Though its sound varies from group to group and from song to song, Perna suggests that timba "is an eclectic fusion of son and rumba with elements of U.S. jazz, funk, and rap" (403). Los Van Van, an experimental fusion group from the 1960s formed by bassist Juan Formell, helped to set the stage for further mixing and experimenting in timba (Moore 2001: 162). The group credited as the first timba band is NG La Banda (Perna 2002: 215). The goal of the group's leader, J.L. Cortés, was "to produce dance music rooted in barrio life mixing jazz, salsa, rumba and rap, and using elaborated arrangements played by young, virtuoso musicians" (215). Perna explains that "one of the hallmarks of timba is precisely its technical difficulty and the virtuosity of its players," who have formal training in Cuban music conservatories (215).11
Timba music sounds similar to that of salsa, though salsa has a longer section before the call-and-response, and timba lyrics use more slang. Maya Roy also suggests that salsa and timba are different due to the context in which both styles developed. She implies that the marginalization of New York immigrants from different parts of the Caribbean, and not just Cuba, was a defining feature of the music and expression of salsa (Roy 2002: 179). Timba has not gained a large following outside of Cuba, perhaps due to foreigners' perceived vulgarities of the lyrics and dance (Perna 2013: 405). The dance consists of free-style and sexually suggestive movements, which creates "a glaring gap" between how insiders and outsiders perceive the music in relation to other, more traditional dance music styles from the island (Roy 2002: 198).
Another factor contributing to timba's lack of popularity outside of Cuba could be a result of the restricted trading relations with the United States (Perna 2013: 405). Despite these limitations in reaching an international audience, Geoff Baker maintains that "timba groups have shifted their emphasis from performing for ordinary locals towards playing for predominantly foreign audiences and economically successful Cubans in clubs and on overseas tours" (2006: 221). Additionally, he suggests that "affordable live performances are rare," and as a result, this music that was originally meant to be an outlet for the marginalized paradoxically often only have access to it through recordings and the radio (221).
Timba ensembles are usually large, typically consisting of at least twelve performers (403). A drum set replaces bongos from salsa, and a synthesizer is added to the sound of the existing keyboard (Moore 2010: 119). The baby bass from salsa is replaced by the electric bass in timba (Perna 2013: 403), however Roy suggests that some timba artists are beginning to bring the baby bass back in hopes of striking a new balance between old and new styles (2002: 201).12 The bass grooves in timba are often more virtuosic than that of preceding dance music styles (Perna 2013: 403). This is likely a result of the increased number of conservatory-trained popular musicians after Cuba's educational campaigns in the years following the revolution, which I discuss in more detail later. As Moore describes, "[timba] bass lines are unpredictable, incorporating fast runs, sustained notes, glissandi, chromatic passages, and slaps" (Moore 2010: 119). Muted "dead" notes and free-meter rhythms are also characteristic features of timba bass (Hermida 2018c, personal communication).
From the early danzón bass lines to the virtuosic timba grooves, the characteristic sound and the role of the bass have changed significantly over the course of the last century. Primarily a time-keeping instrument in early danzón, the son clave timeline rhythm and other percussion instruments gave the bassist more freedom to add syncopation and melodic riffs. Cachao's creative transformations of the danzón accompaniment invited jazz and funk bassists, among others, to also experiment with the rhythmic and melodic role of the instrument. Timba music pushed the envelope once more, adding extended techniques and the "unpredictability" that Moore mentions. What was once an instrument that primarily played quarter notes to keep time for band members, the bass grooves in popular Cuban music styles are now complex and challenging, especially for the outsider. How do Cuban bassists learn these intricate grooves today? Do most students begin with Western classical music training, as did Cachao and Ignacio Piñeiro, or is popular Cuban music now seen as a separate and legitimate tradition that demands a more particular training from the beginning? If the latter is true, then how do Western classically-trained outsiders most effectively learn the syncopated style of Cuban popular music? In an attempt to answer these questions, it is useful to consider the pedagogy and training systems of Western classical and popular music styles on the island.
Though entrance is highly competitive, Cubans have several options for post-secondary music training through schools, such as the Escuela Nacional de Arte (ENA), the Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA), and the Conservatorio Amadeo Roldán (Moore 2001: 160). Moore suggests that "almost all bandleaders involved in popular music since the 1970s received free, high-quality training" at these institutions (160). In turn, the widespread formal music training among popular music performers had a significant effect on proceeding styles, such as timba in the early 1990s. Moore explains that "the technical skills acquired . . . as well as [the formally trained students'] expanded understanding of harmony, theory, and musical form, have contributed to the development of a surprisingly sophisticated and virtuosic pop tradition in recent years" (160). Although popular music performers were trained in music schools, they learned exclusively Western classical music in their studies through the 1980s, as popular music was not seen as worthy of study in institutions of higher education (160). In fact, Moore states that "the overall tendency at the ENA and ISA was to discourage students from playing popular music, even in their spare time" (161). Caridad Zaldivia, the bassist for the Camerata Romeu, confirmed that popular music styles were not a part of the music academy in Cuba. However, she mentioned that students are taught improvisation techniques in the conservatory today, which would suggest that popular music styles have been incorporated to some extent in more recent years (Zaldivia 2018c, personal communication). While Zaldivia believes that Cuban music institutions are still focused solely on Western classical music styles, it seems that popular music styles are now possible to learn in a more formal way. José Hermida, the department chair and bass professor at ENA, has developed a teaching methodology for his conservatory students that are interested in learning popular music. By using a variety of teaching method books, which I discuss later, Hermida's teaching approach is closely related to that of the Western classical tradition, with listening exercises, scales and arpeggios, historical context lessons, among other techniques (Hermida 2018a, personal communication). This Western approach makes sense in the context of music training in Cuban conservatories. Hermida explained that although some students learn popular music styles at ENA, Western classical music is the primary focus of all students in the school. Students who want to make a career out of popular music typically must study Western music first, and with their music degree, they are then able to receive a contract for a job in other genres and styles. Hermida said that there are a few exceptions today where self-taught popular musicians rise to fame before receiving a classical music degree, but aside from these few cases, it is very difficult to find work without having proof of prior Western training (Hermida 2018b, personal communication).
Although Western classically-trained musicians in the United States may have little exposure to popular Cuban music styles, it does not seem that Cuban classical musicians experience the same unfamiliarity with popular dance music despite their Western classical focus in the conservatories. For example, Caridad Zaldivia began as a classical double bassist. She started her career by playing in the Teatro Musical (which no longer exists), and then moved to playing for the opera. Her next position was with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Matanzas, before making the switch to popular music with an all-women quartet playing popular dance styles in bars, hotels, etc. Zaldivia did not enjoy the late nights and logistical difficulties of transporting her bass across town after dark, so she accepted the position in the Camerata Romeu and has been playing for them for the past twenty years. Although it would appear that her switch from the Matanzas symphony to the bar gigs was a drastic one, Zaldivia explained that she had been exposed to popular Cuban music styles from the beginning of her career. In the opera and musical theater orchestras, Zaldivia played various zarzuelas and musicals from Cuba with popular dance styles and rhythms incorporated in the scores. The Matanzas symphony also often played arrangements of danzones as part of various events, so she was already accustomed to the rhythms and styles of Cuban dance music before switching to the quartet (Zaldivia 2018a, personal communication).
For musicians with little exposure to popular Cuban dance music, Zaldivia suggested a practical approach. Instead of learning and interpreting the music and rhythms in a similar vein to how Western classical music is taught in the US, she emphasized becoming familiar with each dance before trying to play them. During my first bass lesson with her, she had me dance the steps of the cha-cha-chá and danzón with the bass in hand before actually playing any notes on the instrument (Zaldivia 2018b, personal communication). Repeatedly throughout subsequent lessons, Zaldivia emphasized that until I understood the interpretation of the music by the dancers, I would not be able to play the music in an appropriate style. Thus, according to Zaldivia, one additional (and crucial) way for Western classically-trained bassists to learn popular Cuban styles is to learn and understand the dances before the chords, harmonies, etc. This approach makes sense especially for learning to feel the anticipated bass in son. The dancers begin their step on beat four, aligning with the "bajo tocado a la'o" (Zaldivia 2018b, personal communication). Thus, although beginning on beat four initially feels counterintuitive to the Western classically-trained bassist, becoming comfortable with the dance steps reverses the feeling of fighting the clave, and beat four begins to feel like the strong beat.
An additional strategy for becoming comfortable with the asymmetrical feeling of the clave is to start with that rhythm instead of the bass groove. On the first day of lessons with Hermida, he pulled out a box full of claves from behind the piano and explained to me that all of his students who want to learn popular Cuban music from him start by learning to play clave. Once a student understands the pattern on its own, he finds that they are more successful in understanding how the anticipated bass fits with that rhythm. Using clave instead of a metronome to learn one's part reflects the tendencies of other African and African-derived musics. Whereas the Western classical inclination is to divide everything into stressed beats and measures, African musics more commonly use rhythmic relationships between two or more instruments to keep track of time (Chernoff 1979: 51).13 Timeline instruments, including clave and bells, are often played in African and African-derived styles for the primary function of assisting other musicians to mark their place in the music. Thus, it is imperative for the bassist to understand how their part interlocks with the clave in order to lock in the groove.14
There are also various method books that have attempted to provide resources and technical exercises to bassists who are unfamiliar with the playing style of Cuban popular music. While some of these method books are more helpful than others, none of them are likely an ideal option on their own for learning and understanding the broad scope of popular Cuban dance music. For instance, Lincoln Goines and Robby Ameen's Funkifying the Clave: Afro-Cuban Grooves for Bass and Drums provides very basic information (usually a sentence or two) about various different genres such as the mambo, son, and cha-cha-chá (Ameen and Goines 1993). The target audience of the book is primarily for jazz players who want to "spice up" their grooves rather than bassists who want to learn the various Afro-Cuban styles. By contrast, Carlos del Puerto and Silvio Vergara's The True Cuban Bass remains focused on Cuban styles rather than jazz modifications (1994). The book is bilingual, which suggests that the target audience may include bassists in Cuba who are unfamiliar with playing popular music styles. However, like Goines and Ameen's book, The True Cuban Bass provides minimal social or historical context and also assumes that the reader has a general understanding of Cuban musical features such as clave, tumbao, and the montuno section, among others. NG La Banda's bass player, Feliciano Arango, along with Cherina Mastrantones have published a method book focused on timba, entitled Cuban Timba: A Contemporary Bass Technique. Like del Puerto and Vergara's book, this one is also bilingual, and provides short and focused exercises to learn and understand important historical and technical features of timba, such as its historical connection to son, dead notes, and playing the guaguancó15 clave pattern (2008). Arango and Mastrantones's book is a useful resource for bassists who are both interested in timba as an independent music style, in addition to the possibilities of applying timba techniques to other styles. As the authors explain in Part Three: "We know that Timba with its rich tumbao, can be fused with many other styles, and we have selected a few Jazz standards to show a way that the Timba flavor can be fused with other forms of music that are not related to Cuban Popular Dance Music" (Arango and Mastrantones 2008: 64). Uribe's The Essence of Afro-Cuban Percussion and Drum Set is amenable to the Cuban music outsider, as it provides a bit more context and more detailed explanations for various rhythmic patterns from a wider variety of popular Cuban dance music genres (2006). However, as its title suggests, the book is geared towards percussionists rather than bass players. The most comprehensive method book series for bass is likely Kevin Moore's Beyond Salsa Bass: The Cuban Timba Revolution books, which first appeared in the 2000s and include genres that are left out of the other books mentioned, such as changüí and mozambique. This is José Hermida's preferred method book series to use with his students as a primary teaching resource (Hermida 2018a, personal communication).16 On a more practical note, the eventual 7-volume series is not easily affordable to the average music student who may have only a general interest in popular Cuban music styles, since each book costs $30 and audio examples for each volume are an additional charge. In sum, there is not an easily-accessible resource for Western classically-trained bassists to find accurate contextual information, audio, and transcriptions in one place. However, when paired together there are numerous resources that may provide a helpful starting point for understanding the historical development, rhythmic patterns, and playing techniques for students without access to a teacher who performs Cuban music.
Bass lines in popular Cuban dance music have become more stylized, more syncopated, and more virtuosic over the last century, thanks to important figures such as Cachao, Piñeiro, and Rodríguez. Though the middle class-influenced danzón began with simple harmonic and rhythmic structures, bass playing in popular Cuban music developed through son and other genres into highly virtuosic playing with extended techniques and complex rhythmic structures by the end of the twentieth century. International music trends, like jazz and hip hop, have influenced recent styles of virtuosic bass playing, such as that of timba, in popular Cuban dance music today. Cuba's emphasis on Western music education has also played an important role in preparing musicians for the new technical demands of the instrument in these styles. While an all-inclusive historical and pedagogical resource does not exist for learning about the role of the bass in popular Cuban dance music, a combination of existing methods will likely provide a reasonable starting point for the interested student. For the Western classically-trained bassist without prior familiarity to popular Cuban music styles, an understanding of the clave pattern and dance steps are of special importance to grasping the stylistic nuances. Once one understands and feels the dance steps and rhythms in the percussion, the bass groove makes more sense despite its opposite tendencies from emphasizing the downbeat in Western classical music.
While more research is necessary to develop the ideal pedagogical method for popular Cuban dance music, this paper hopefully provides an initial orientation regarding current resources. Having knowledge of the development of the bass line in Cuban musics over the last century is imperative to understanding the more recent stylistic changes. Like with learning any music style, it is also valuable to recognize the social, political, and economic factors that have contributed to the musical characteristics and changes of the genre. Learning popular Cuban dance music styles through clave, dance, a combination of method books, and cultural context will help to ensure that the groove will lock in with the other musicians even in the absence of a strong downbeat, and the band will not ever have to stop for the bassist again.
Ameen, Robby and Lincoln Goines. Funkifying the Clave: Afro-Cuban Grooves for Bass and Drums. New York: Manhattan Music Publications, 1993.
Arango, Feliciano and Cherina Mastrantone. El Bajo Contemporáneo de La Timba Cubana. New York: ArangoTones, 2008.
Baker, Geoff. "'La Habana que no conoces': Cuban Rap and the Social Construction of Urban Space." Ethnomusicology Forum 15, no. 2 (2006): 215-46.
Blanco, Jesús. Ochenta años del son y soneros en el Caribe. Caracas, VZ: Tropykos, 1992.
Chernoff, John Miller. African Rhythm and African Sensibility: Aesthetics and Social Action in African Musical Idioms. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1979.
García, David F. Arsenio Rodríguez and the Transnational Flows of Latin Popular Music. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2006.
Gónzalez, Neris, and Liliana Casanella. "Septeto." In Encyclopedia of Latin American Popular Music, edited by George Torres. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2013.
Hermida, José Ernesto. 2018a. Interview by the author. June 13, 2018, Vedado, Havana.
____________. 2018b. Interview by the author. June 19, 2018, Vedado, Havana.
__________________. 2018c. Interview by the author. June 22, 2018, Vedado, Havana.
__________________. 2018d. Interview by the author. June 23, 2018, Vedado, Havana.
"López, Israel 'Cachao.'" In Encyclopedia of Popular Music, edited by Colin Larkin. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
Madrid, Alejandro L. and Robin Moore. Danzón: Circum-Caribbean Dialogues in Music and Dance. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.
Monroy Romero, Juan Manuel. "An Analysis of the Evolution of Improvised Double Bass Solos in Afro-Cuban Jazz." Doctoral Essay, University of Miami, 2017.
Moore, Robin. "¿Revolución con Pachanga? Dance Music in Socialist Cuba." Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies 26, no. 52 (2001): 151-77.
Moore, Robin. Music in the Hispanic Caribbean: Experiencing Music, Expressing Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
Perna, Vincenzo A. "Dancing the Crisis, Singing the Past: Musical Dissonances in Cuba during the Período Especial." Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies 11, no. 2 (2002): 213-29.
________________. Timba: The Sound of the Cuban Crisis. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2005.
________________. "Timba." In Encyclopedia of Latin American Popular Music, edited by George Torres. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2013.
Puerto, Carlos del, and Silvio Vergara. The True Cuban Bass. Petaluma, CA: Sher Music Co, 1994.
Roy, Maya. Cuban Music. Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers, 2002.
Sublette, Ned. Cuba and Its Music: From the First Drums to the Mambo. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2004.
Uribe, Ed. The Essence of Afro-Cuban Percussion and Drum Set. Los Angeles: Alfred Publishing, (1996) 2006.
Vaughan, Umi. Rebel Dance, Renegade Stance: Timba Music and Black Identity in Cuba. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2012.
Zaldivia, Caridad. 2018a. Interview by the author. June 11, 2018, Convento de San Francisco, Old Havana.
______________. 2018b. Interview by the author. June 13, 2018, Convento de San Francisco, Old Havana.
______________. 2018c. Interview by the author. June 15, 2018, Convento de San Francisco, Old Havana.
1 In 4/4 time, the cinquillo rhythm begins with a quarter note, followed by an eighth note, quarter note, eighth note, quarter note.
2 Listen to "Almendra" by Abelardo Valdés, one of the most famous Cuban danzones, for a clear example of the cinquillo rhythm.
3 It is worth noting that the exact origin of mambo is still disputed among performers and scholars today.
4 The botija is an aerophone that resembles a large jug with two openings. The player sounds the instrument by blowing into one of the openings.
5 The marimbula is a large lamellophone that is used as a bass instrument in various music styles throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. The player often sits on the large resonating box and plucks the attached metal plates from between their legs.
6 There is some discrepancy between Sublette and Blanco's historical accounts of the switch from botija to double bass. Blanco records the Sexteto Habanero having appeared with double bass in 1925, and the Botón de Oro, formed in 1924, included bassist Alberto Vasconcelos (30). In any case, the bass quickly became a staple of son groups in the late 1920s and beyond.
7 Abelardo Valdés's "Almendra" is one such example.
8 This phrase comes from "tocar al lado," which literally means "to play on the side." However, "al lado" is modified to "a'lao" to more closely resemble the colloquial pronunciation of Cuban Spanish (Hermida 2018b, personal communication).
9 For an example of Rodríguez's melodic bass lines, listen to "No toque el guao" from 1948. As you listen, you will hear the bass line follow the melodic contour and the rhythm to the vocals of "se hin-cha." For a transcription, see García 2006: 44.
10 Perna writes that Ortiz "reports the term timba as the name for a type of gambling, and as part of the expression 'tener timba,' meaning to be able to do something difficult or meritorious" (2005: 101). It seems that timba has had various meanings since that time and was only later incorporated into Afro-Cuban barrio (neighborhood) slang to reference a party.
11 NG La Banda's song "La Bruja" (The Witch) from 1994 is a good example of the new virtuosic bass lines in timba, including more syncopations, glissandos, dead notes, and slaps.
12 One such example is Yoedis Oconor playing baby bass in the timba orchestra Clave Cubana Timbera (CCT).
13 The timeline rhythm of the clave is the most obvious starting point since the instrument's role is essentially just that: to give the other instrumentalists a sense of where they are rhythmically.
14 While the timeline is an important starting point, other rhythm section instruments, such as piano and guitar, also play a crucial role in determining the rhythmic patterns of the bass line. The idea is generally to keep an interlocking polyrhythmic pattern, so if the piano or guitar switches to playing on the off-beats, the bass can abandon the anticipated pattern (Hermida 2018b, personal communication).
15 As Arango and Mastrantones explain, this rumba-derived clave differs from son clave due to the third note falling on the "and" of four rather than directly on beat four.
16 At the time of this writing, José Hermida was in the process of creating his own bass method book for popular Cuban dance music styles, incorporating ideas from various methods mentioned here in addition to his own teaching and playing techniques (Hermida 2018d, personal communication).
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