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Peru Negro: The New Soul of Black Peru
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Global Rhythm, Peru Negro: The New Soul of Black Peru >>
Long before Susana Baca introduced "Black Peru" to international audiences, the Lima-based folkloric ensemble Peru Negro was already there, preserving the music and dances of Peru's little-known black communities. Unheralded outside of their homeland for more then three decades, thy've increasingly reached out to North American and European audiences. A featured performer on David Byrne and Yale Evlev's 1995 Luaka Bop release, The Soul of Black Peru, they recently released their second internationally distributed album, Jolgorio, on Times Square Records.
As audiences on their February tour of the United States discovered, recordings offer little hint of the experience of attending Peru Negro's concerts. While eight musicians and two vocalists resurrect African and Creole influences on an assortment of traditional Afro-Peruvian percussion instruments (cajon, cjita and quijada de burro), conga, acoustic guitar and bass, 10 colorfully costumed dancers-five men and five women-respond to the music with highly energetic stepping.
Led by 40-year-old dancer, percussionist and vocalist Ronaldo "Rony" Campos, son of the group's late founder, Renaldo Campos de la Colina, Peru Negro remains very much a family effort. Campos' wife, Monica Duenas, sings lead vocals, while one of his sons, Edar Campos, is a dancer, as is a niece, Milagros Valdivia Campos. His sister even handles the wardrobe. "sixty percent of the band is related to one another," Juan Morillo, Peru Negro's American manager/spokesperson said.
The roots of Peru Negro's music go back to the eighteenth century, when Peru banned slaves, who mostly worked in the country's mines, from playing drums. Undeterred by the banning, they soon found alternatives. The cajon evolved from wooden fruit crates and is hit by hand by a player who sits atop it. Its intricate rhythms provide the foundation of nearly every tune.
"The cajon basically has two tones, a high pitch and a low pitch," Morillo explained. "It's up to the skill of the player to be able to play different sounds. I've seen people make it sound like congas or djembes."
The other indigenous percussion instruments, the cajita and the guijida de burro, provide equally unique tines. The cajita is a small, lidded, church collection box that is hit with a stick with one hand, and clapped open and closed with the other. The quijida de burro is literally the jawbone of an ass, that's been dried out and is beaten with the palm, causing the loosened teeth to vibrate.
Initially limited to home and informal sessions, Afro-Peruvian music began to be performed on concert stage in the 1950s. "This theater person, a playwright and stage director, Manual Dural, had this play, Panco Fierro," Morillo said, "that involved a black family that lived in Lima. They needed music so they got Nicomedes Santa Cruz and Renaldo Campos." Inspired by the play's success, Santa Cruz formed a band, Cumana, with Campos and influential percussionist, "Jesus "El Nino" Nicasion. The group reached it's peak in the 1960s . "When more whites and people of mixed race in Peru became interested in the music," Morillo said, "that's when it really took off. It was similar to what was happening in other parts of the world. In Africa, nations were becoming independent. There was the civil rights movement in the United States. Blacks in Peru pushed to be more prominent in Peruvian society."
A year before the breakup of Cumana in 1970, Campos formed Peru Negro. They performed their first show on February 26, 1969. "Renaldo was a natural musician," Morillo said. "He never really received formal training as a musician. But, he was a dancer. He played the horn and some guitar. He sang. He formed the group, he had the ability to tell the dancers how to dance, the guitarists how to play, the singers how to be resonating and rich. It was just natural, he never really trained for that.
Shortly before Peru Negro recorded their first internationally distributed album, Sangre De Un Don ("Heritage of A Gentleman"),in 2001, Campos succumbed to a brain hemorrhage at the age of 73. The album was dedicated to his memory.
Monica Duenas, who joined Peru Negro in 1994, is the latest in a long line great vocalists in the band. Two of her predecessors Eva Allyon and Lucila Campos, went on to successful solo careers after leaving the group. "It's difficult to make a comparison," Morillo said. "They each had different styles. The first female singer in Peru Negro had more of a Celia Cruz style of singing. Monica has a softer voice but, at the same time, it as a lot of power."
In addition to singing lead with Peru Negro, Duena oversees Peru Negrita, a training school mostly for the offspring of band members and former band members. "They want the kids to learn the dances," Morillo said. It appears that Peru Negro will be with us for a long, long time. 06/01/04
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