Mention Peruvian music and what springs to mind -- if anything -- is the tooting, soothing and birdlike sounds of the Andean panpipes that have somehow come to stand in for the entire music culture of a country nearly the size of Alaska. It would be simplistic to say that the popular conception of Peruvian culture is, well, simplistic.

For many, it comes as a surprise to learn that the population of Peru -- like just about everyplace else on this side of the Atlantic -- was touched by the legacy of the slave trade: that there are blacks in Peru. That the descendants of enslaved Africans in Peru, a small minority, went on to shape some of the most dynamic music of the region -- a hybrid that is distinctly Afro-Peruvian -- will come as no shocker to anyone familiar with the rich musical legacy of the African diaspora. Perhaps the most pleasant surprise about this story is that the Hartford area will soon host Perú Negro, one of the groups that took the music and dance of black Peru out of the countryside and presented it to the nation and the world.

Perú Negro was formed 35 years ago, when Ronaldo Campos had a gig playing the cajón, a box drum, at a restaurant in Lima, the capital city. This was at a time when a new revolutionary military government in Peru was seeking to promote homegrown Peruvian folklore and culture. Campos began drawing more extensively on the tradition of black music from his home district of El Carmen, and Perú Negro was born. After the group won the grand prize at a festival of Hispanoamerican song and dance held in Argentina, Perú Negro was embraced at home as a showpiece of Peruvian cultural heritage. In the early 1970s, the government championed the group, giving Perú Negro funding in an attempt to showcase Peruvian culture at home and abroad. They toured the world, but the group's fortunes rose and fell with that of government. By the mid-1980s, the group had largely lost its state patronage, and though it never disbanded, Perú Negro found itself back to performing in small restaurants and nightclubs, playing for tourists.

The music of black Peru is extraordinary; the rhythms are complex and infectious, complete with thick layers of assertive percussion, driving handclaps, and persistently off-beat phrasing; the group singing is joyous. There's a flamenco flourish, braided with light floating flute lines and brawny beats played on conga and cajón (the wooden box drum).

Like those in the U.S., slaves in Peru were forbidden from playing the drums in the 18th century, as a result, rhythmic, percussion-heavy music was adapted to other instruments. And groups like Perú Negro had to work to uncover and in some cases to forge a link to the African heritage of Peru's blacks.

After more than a third of a century, Perú Negro is back. And it looks like the 21st Century might be a good one for the group. The big exposure for Afro-Peruvian music and for Perú Negro came in 1995 when David Byrne released The Soul of Black Peru , a real masterpiece that focused attention on the group. Out of the blue, the world was interested again. After founder Ronaldo Campos died in 2001, his son Rony took over and a revived Perú Negro began recording and touring again. Last month, Perú Negro released its new record, Jolgorio , only the band's fourth recording. And when Perú Negro takes the stage in New Britain, it will be part of the group's first visit to the East Coast.

Though Perú Negro is not widely known here, the group's producer, Juan Morillo, who spoke to the Advocate recently while in between sold-out shows in California, says their return to the touring circuit --with 10 dancers and 10 musicians on stage -- is big news in Peru. It's the latest twist on a long, curvy journey toward world acclaim, as recent write-ups in the New York Times and the New Yorker attest. But it's been a long time coming.

When the band was first discovered at home they received something of a royal introduction.

"Perú Negro had the fortune to be introduced to the rest of Peruvian society by Chabuca Granda, probably the most famous composer that ever came out of Peru," says Morillo. "[Granda] was part of the upper class and she was very respected, not only in Peru but in all of South America. She brought them in and said 'These are my friends; they're great and you better love them,' and that did a lot for them."

The music of Perú Negro was also taken up by the queen of Salsa, Celia Cruz, who recorded a salsa version of "Toro Mata," one of the group's signature tunes. It's based on a dance that ridicules the stiff carriage of European dances, especially the minuet.

Central to Perú Negro's music is the lando , one of the signature dance and song forms of Afro-Peruvian music. As the blues are to the Mississippi Delta and the tango is to Argentina, so is the lando to Peru, says Morillo.

Another dance often featured in Perú Negro's repertoire is an adaptation of the "Son de los Diablos" ("Dance of the Devils"), which took place at the end of the Corpus Christi processions in Catholic Peru. Morello says the "devils" in the Peruvian version were taunting masked dancers, similar to those found in West Africa, Jamaica and Puerto Rico.

"At the end of the procession -- which was all about god, angels and heavenly images -- came the bad guys, the devils," he says. "And the characters were usually black people. Nobody knows exactly how it was danced at the time, but they know it was procession style. The devils would go around to the audience and tease them. That's the origin of that. It was performed with donkey jaw and cajitas [percussion accompaniment]."

Though the music of Perú Negro is drawn from numerous strands, Morello says it's unique.

"It's Latin music, the kind you've never heard before. It has some Spanish elements, some Indian elements and African elements, but it's definitely not like the music of the Cubans, the Puerto Ricans or the Colombians, who also have those elements."

In addition to Perú Negro's new recordings and their return to international touring, it appears that there is also a growing academic interest in Afro-Peruvian music, with ensembles specializing in the music popping up at colleges and universities in the U.S. Ethnomusicologist Heidi Feldman has written a book Black Rhythms of Peru: Staging Cultural Memory Through Music and Dance scheduled to be published next year. Feldman, who spoke by phone with the Advocate from California said that groups like Perú Negro have worked to preserve and build upon the connection to Africa.

"This is music that is intended to represent the forgotten African past in Peru," says Feldman. "In Perú Negro, in particular, the percussion tapestry has become much more dense. That is really their contribution -- they have re-Africanized the sound of Afro-Peruvian music."