It’s a funny thing about music: it does not recognize the imaginary boundaries men have drawn on maps or in the ground. Put simply: music transcends borders. It travels into the ear of its listeners then, hopefully, into their hearts as well, no matter where they live. And music does not need a passport to accomplish this. That is part of the appeal of World Music for aficionados from anywhere on the globe. We have had a plethora of Euro café discs, Middle Eastern lounge CDs and Indonesian trip-hop fusion albums while, regretfully, Central American music has been nearly unheard during this wave of international awareness. Until now. A joint venture by the four most popular and progressive recording labels in this part of the world has begun to fill that void with the release of La Caja de Musica Centroamericana, the Central American Music Box.
This compilation of sixteen songs showcases musical styles that ignore the borders of places we call Nicaragua, Belize, Honduras, Guatemala and Costa Rica. The Garifuna music represented here from Ivan Duran’s Stonetree label from Belize is a good example. The Garifuna culture was spawned nearly four centuries ago when survivors from two sinking slave ships began cohabitating with the indigenous Carib tribes, including the Arawaks on the islands of Saint Vincent (in the Lesser Antilles), Dominica and Santa Lucia, as well as with other escaped African slaves. Later, under British domain, they were relocated to the Honduran island of Roatan and from there they migrated to the surrounding countries in Central America. The resulting music is unique, mesmerizing, and anything but Latin.
It had never crossed my mind that one of the reasons that the Osa Peninsula has remained such pristine terrain is because its isolation has helped it to remain an entity. This geographical logic comes up early in the text of the stunning new book “Osa – Where the Rainforest Meets the Sea”, a successful collage of photographic art and insightful journalistic essays that portray this unique region in southwest Costa Rica like no publication that has preceded it. In fact, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and Harvard Professor Emeritus Edward O. Wilson proclaimed the work, “the best way to experience (Osa) short of going there.” High accolades, indeed.
Recently, the University of Costa Rica published its third edition of “The History of Costa Rica”, the first of its kind to be translated and printed in the English language. Written by Ivan Molina and Steven Palmer, two of the leading and most recognized Costa Rican historians, the book is concise yet thorough and current, spanning this country’s rich history from the arrival of human beings, at around 12,000 B.C., to the beginning of the Twenty-First Century, including the bulk of Arias’ term as president of the country.
This is the fifth book to be written in collaboration by these two authors. Palmer has a Ph.D. in Latin American History from Colombia University in New York and Molina received his Masters degree in History at the University of Costa Rica, where both men have taught. Their books have won many prestigious awards, including the Aquileo Echeverria National Prize in History, the Cleto Gonzalez Viquez Prize in History and the Ancora Prize from La Nacion, Costa Rica’s premier newspaper. The book comes armed with eight different maps, more than eighty photographs, paintings and drawings, a comprehensive bibliography and an index that offers its readers a handy, thorough reference and complete chronicle of key events in Costa Rica’s history.
The origin of reggae in Costa Rica dates back to the 1920s, when Jamaican leader Marcus Garvey evoked his ideas and beliefs throughout the Caribbean province of Limon. Born in St. Anne’s Bay, Jamaica, the future birthplace of Bob Marley, Garvey is considered the prophet of Rastafarianism. So, it is easy to see how reggae music is considered a kind of Costa Rican folk music.
Remaining consistent in its mission statement, Papaya Music recently unveiled its newest release, Costa Rica Reggae Nights. The CD embraces a variety of Costa Rican reggae bands and styles. Included on this disc are eleven bands, demonstrating the versatility during a span of the past two decades of reggae in this country. All the recordings were previously unreleased and the compilation offers songs in Spanish, English, and Limon Creole.
Writing humor is a cruel, nasty and thankless endeavor more times than not. Trust me because I have tried. Telling a humorous story in person to a group of people is completely different because the speaker can control the pace, the cadence, the intonation and eventually, the punch line. Writing these same words onto a page, handing it to a complete stranger, walking away and allowing the writing to convey humor on its own takes a leap of faith and a unique storytelling talent for the humorist to succeed. And Matt Casseday has pulled it off.
Sr. Casseday is a fifty-something ex-pat who has been calling Costa Rica home for more than two decades. He has been living in the Quepos area for about half that time and writing columns for Quepolandia, the local monthly magazine there, for more than five years. He recently culled through his collection of articles, selecting fifty-four of them to compile into a publication of his own, titled Crazy From the Heat. I think the operative word in that title is the first one, and I mean that in a good way. Matt takes a wry look at the trials and tribulations of living within another culture, specifically, being a “gringo in Ticolandia”, as he calls it. Sr. Casseday has lived and worked in a few different locales as well as owned a car and a business in Costa Rica, is married with a Costa Rican woman, and in short, has easily garnered enough material for his book with first-hand experience.
The essence of Calypso is in its rhythm and its humor, not necessarily in that order. The seed of this musical style sprouted around Barbados, Trinidad and Ciudad Colon, Panama. It spread, literally by word of mouth, to other Caribbean ports, including Kingston, Jamaica, where it spawned the nucleus of reggae music.
Walter Ferguson is probably the last Calypsonian to learn his craft in this traditional, organic manner. Born in Guabito, Panama in 1919, he moved to Cahuita, Costa Rica at an early age with his father, Melsh, who was a cook for the Banana Company there. For years, Ferguson, or “Gavitt” as he is affectionately referred to by his wife and family, plied his trade with an old Martin guitar, creating songs and exchanging them with other wandering Calypso minstrels up and down the Caribbean coast of Central America. Walter even recorded a vinyl album of original songs in the early 1970s, which quickly slipped into obscurity along with its composer.
Armando is a young Tico boy who has lived his entire nine years with his family, just a stones-throw from Playa Real on the Pacific Ocean in Guanacaste, Costa Rica. He’s a smart kid with an active curiosity and Playa Real has continually offered him an abundance of different ways to explore and learn. Upon his request, Armando’s father allows him to spend the night alone on the beach on the evening of his ninth birthday because Armando wants to witness the phenomena of the Baula turtles coming ashore to lay their eggs. What transpires on that night has a huge impact on Armando: he does, indeed, see a Baula lay her eggs. In fact, the turtle introduces herself (Yes! She speaks!) as “Annabella”, or Bella for short, and has quite a story to tell the impressionable Armando.
Religious hymns and spiritual music have played a role in Costa Rican culture for more than two centuries. Traditionally, however, the practice of organized groups celebrating and singing these songs has been confined to within their respective church walls, primarily in Limon and San Jose. Enter music historian Manuel Obregon, who is also the president and founder of Papaya Music, Costa Rica’s premier music label. Obregon felt this musical legacy deserved to be shared with the general public. So he enlisted more than thirty participants from a variety of denominations to perform live for two nights for an audience at National Theater in San Jose, which is truly how gospel music should be heard; live rather than canned studio work. Appropriately, a recording of this event, “Wade in the Water” has recently been released.
Armando is a young Tico boy who has lived his entire nine years with his family, just a stones-throw from Playa Real on the Pacific Ocean in Guanacaste, Costa Rica. He’s a smart kid with an active curiosity and Playa Real has continually offered him an abundance of different ways to explore and learn. Upon his request, Armando’s father allows him to spend the night alone on the beach on the evening of his ninth birthday because Armando wants to witness the phenomena of the Baula turtles coming ashore to lay their eggs. What transpires on that night has a huge impact on Armando: he does, indeed, see a Baula lay her eggs. In fact, the turtle introduces herself (Yes! She speaks!) as “Annabella”, or Bella for short, and has quite a story to tell the impressionable Armando.
by Jim Parisi