Afro-Cuban Music: A Bibliographic Guide is an impressive accomplishment that will prove an invaluable resource for researchers. It is well-organized and offers comprehensive coverage of the available literature, particularly periodical sources which would otherwise be difficult to find. Users will also appreciate the many annotations included for the details they provide on each work’s contents.
—Robin Moore, University of Texas at Austin, author of Nationalizing Blackness: Afrocubanismo and Artistic Revolution in Cuba, 1920-1940

DESCRIPTION
In spite of its relatively small size Cuba has had an inordinately large musical influence both inside the Caribbean and abroad. From the 'rhumba'(son) craze of the 1920s and '30s to mambo and cha-cha-cha in the 1950s and '60s and the Buena Vista Social Club phenomenon of the late '90s, Cuba has been central to popular music developments throughout the Caribbean, Latin America, the United States and Europe.

Unfortunately, no one has ever attempted to survey the extensive literature on the island’s music, in particular the vernacular contributions of its Afro-Cuban population. This unprecedented bibliographic guide attempts to do just that. Ranging from the 19th century to early 2009 it offers almost 5000 entries on all of the island’s main genre families, e.g. Cancion Cubana, Danzon, Son, Rumba, and Sacred Musics (Santeria, Palo, Abakua, and Arara), as well as such recent developments as timba, rap and regueton. It also provides sections on Afro-Cuban musical instruments, the music’s influence abroad, and a biographical and critical component covering the lives and careers of more than 800 artists and ensembles. Spanish-language sources are covered comprehensively, in particular dozens of locally published journals such as Bohemia, Carteles, Revolucion y Cultura, Revista Salsa Cubana, and Tropicana Internacional, all indexed here for the first time, as well as the sizable international literature in English, French, and other European languages.

The work concludes with an extensive reference section offering lists of Sources Consulted, a guide to relevant Libraries and Archives, an appendix listing artists and ensembles by idiom/occupation, and two detailed Author and Subject Indexes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JOHN GRAY is director of the Black Arts Research Center. His previous publications include: Jamaican Popular Music, from Mento to Dancehall Reggae; From Vodou to Zouk; African Music; Fire Music: A Bibliography of the New Jazz, 1959-1990; and Blacks in Classical Music.

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