THINK of Peruvian music and dance and you probably imagine Andean folk groups, blowing their pan pipes in Times Square or plazas throughout Europe. Yet there's another side to Peruvian culture, the African side. And for more than 30 years, the most respected caretaker of this Afro-Peruvian tradition has been the music and dance ensemble Peru Negro. On Saturday at Town Hall, the company will make its New York debut.

The Afro-Peruvian tradition dates from the introduction of slaves in the 1700's. By the middle of the last century it had almost disappeared, but a rising interest in black pride rekindled an interest in the old tradition. In Peru, a number of groups began tapping the memories of old-timers and bringing back the old ways. It wasn't until Peru Negros's triumphant debut at the 1969 Hispanoamerican Festival of Song and Dance, however, that the interest became a craze.

It was a dance craze. This music makes people move, an effect that is also a cause. Even in the studio, recording Peru Negro's newest CD, ''Jolgorio'' (a Spanish term that refers to a state of celebratory frenzy), the musicians wouldn't think of playing without their human metronomes: the dancers, keeping time in their bodies. There's tradition in those bodies, too. Peru Negro's flirtatious courtship dances resemble their Afro-Cuban cousins. Other times, the dancers look possessed, as in the rituals of santeria, by spirits from Africa.

Some resonances are closer to home. The early banning of drums, for example, led Peruvian field slaves to discover the music's signature instrument, the box or cajon (only recently adopted by flamenco groups), in the same way that American slaves developed tap dancing. Peruvians improvised with their feet as well, in stomping duels called zapateo. And their dances mocking the stiffness of their European masters recall the high-stepping cakewalk of American slaves.

The traditions of Peru Negro, though carefully researched and preserved, aren't static. Reinaldo Campos, the group's founder, who died in 2001, was known for creating more furiously syncopated cajon patterns and for introducing Afro-Cuban skin drums. Mr. Campos's wife, Bertha, is the only member remaining from the original troupe. She's 74. The group's youngest member is 14. ''What is changing is the pace of the dance,'' said Juan Morillo, the troupe's producer. ''People dance faster now.''

Some in the New York audience might be familiar with the company from ''The Soul of Black Peru,'' a 1995 compilation album released by David Byrne's Luaka Bop label. But Mr. Morillo says, the reaction of most American audiences is shock: ''Black people in Peru? It's a revelation.'' BRIAN SEIBERT