IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 5 ENGLISH | Page 125

They are structured in octo-syllabic
quartets with consonant rhyme. It is not
unusual to find other meters and free
verse.

bean people living in Argentina, with
whom they interacted in social spaces.
The process of becoming “traditionlike” began, among other reasons, because they identified with Afrodescendant composers and lyricists, the
lyrics were about something black
and/or revealed empathy in the music’s
form and/or content. Thus, the process
ended up situating the resulting pieces
in their own genre, and sui generis, the
open rhumba, which also refers to an
instrumental way of playing rhumba,
but with Candombe clave.

Recurring themes are about love and
games; their tone is playful and honest.
Other works are short and tend to be
interpreted in ad hoc arrangements.
In terms of their melody and rhythm,
they are very similar to urban tango and
milonga. In fact, some of them have
parallel tonality from section to section,
which causes one to think about the
origin of these genres. So, the 3-3-4-2-4
clave y
cell, or variants, condition a large part of the melody.

Given its diversity of sources, as it is an
eclectic repertory, they are generally
lively pieces with a binary rhythm ( =
120 a 140); they are syllabic and melodious, and ideal for being sung in
unison, by a group, with accompanying
drums, bongos and, occasionally, clave
and other percussion instruments, like a
small drum set.

Candombe is basically vocal and instrumental, with tempo is around = 95,
which requires rhythmic choreographic
figures. Men and women dance it apart,
with a high degree of improvisation.
The instrumental interpretation represents an Afro matrix regarding functions (clave, base or improvisation), sets
of two drums; major drum, tumba base,
llamador or quinto and repicador/repiqueteador,
contestador
or
requinto), each one a bit smaller, which
are played with the hands. The vocal
part is usually structured like a dialogue
between two people.

4) Contemporary Afro-Porteño. There
are 12 songs in Spanish, with Spanish
poetic patterns or free verse and no
rhythm. They were recently created: the
oldest one goes back to 2000. The lyrics
are self-referential in nature, defend
Afro-Argentinean-ness and even criticize white society. Some are only sung
vocally; others according to the interpretive dynamic of the Traditional AfroPorteño repertory or that of modern
pieces that are “traditional-like.” The
melody and rhythm of most of them is
free, which impedes in them being sung
in a group, except the refrain (when
there is one). They are functionally
simpler.

3) Modern, “traditional-like” pieces.
This repertoire is fundamentally dance
music for loose couples. There are 31
songs and 1 instrumental piece that are
of Caribbean origin, with few exceptions, and were in fashion beginning in
the 1930s. Afro-Porteños learned this
music due to mass communication and
other musicians, and even from Carib-

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