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Presentations by Puerto Rican musicians, Eldrid Arntzen, Joao dos Santos, and Negrura Peruana

PerformerPerformed by Joao dos Santos (Portuguese)

PerformerPerformed by Eldrid Arntzen

Date2003-2004

Mediumreformatted digital file from VHS tape

DimensionsDuration: 11 Minutes, 9 Seconds

ClassificationsGraphics

Credit LineConnecticut Cultural Heritage Arts Program collections

CopyrightIn Copyright

Object number2015.196.683a-b

DescriptionCompilation VHS tape for a grant submission featuring performances by Puerto Rican musicians at the 2003 Concurso de Trovadores in Hartford; a demonstration by Norwegian rosemaler Eldrid Arntzen; Portuguese fandango performed by Joao dos Santos; and African-Peruvian musicians Negura Peruana performing at Central Connecticut State University.

NotesBiographical Note: Joao dos Santos was born in the Portuguese village of Mir de Aire in Ribetejo, the province east of Lisbon which is the center of Portuguese bullfighting. He has been a musician playing the ret ret, a scraped wooden stick, with the Hartford-area dance group Rancho Folclorico do Clube Portugues de Hartford, and served as ensaiador, the dance instructor, in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Joao's specialty is fandango, which he learned from an older Ribatejano living in Hartford, Joachim Duarte. This dance done by two men facing each other while they swing long sticks under the other's feet, displays a contest of virility between cattle herders as they fight over a woman. Rarely performed by local folk dance groups in public in North America because of its difficulty, the fandango is also danced at weddings where its meaning can be eloquently expressed as part of the celebration. Joao taught fandango to two apprentices from the Ludlow Mass Portuguese folk dance group, in Year 7 (2004-2005) of the Southern New England Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program.

Biographical Note: Eldrid Sjkold Arntzen was born in the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn in 1935, which had a Norwegian immigrant population of around 50,000. She has been painting various styles of rosemaling, decorative painting on wood, since the age of ten, studying with rosemaling masters in Norway and the U.S. Her work has received recognition from members of the Norwegian-American community by being chosen as the Gold Medal winner in 1987 and the People’s Choice Award in 2003 at Vesterheim, the Norwegian-American museum in Decorah, Iowa. In April 2004, Eldrid was an invited panelist and teacher for the first international symposium on rosemaling, organized by Vesterheim. This significant honor situates her among the leaders of this folk art form such as Nils Ellingsgard and Sigmund Aarseth from Norway.

Eldrid has traveled all over the country to demonstrate and teach rosemaling. In addition to her classes at Vesterheim's Handverkskole, she was a regular summer teacher at Fletcher Farm School in Vermont and Land of the Vikings in Pennsylvania. She has taught American rosemaling in Norway and conducted workshops for the Sons of Norway in Fairbanks, Alaska. As a master traditional artist in Southern New England Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program, Eldrid taught rosemaling design to three apprentices from Massachusetts and one from Connecticut. Eldrid’s house is full of boxes, chairs, bowls, cabinets, trays, and containers that she has painted for her family to use.

Rosemaling on wood furniture, household objects, and even walls flourished in rural Norway during the mid-17th to the mid-19th centuries and was transplanted to America by immigrants. There are numerous styles within rosemaling, requiring different designs, colors, and brush techniques. As well as the Valdres style, Eldrid paints styles including Hallingdal, Gudbrandsdal, Vest Agder, Aust Agder, and her favorite, the asymmetrical Telemark style which itself has several variants. A hallmark of Eldrid's skill is that she is one of only a few in the United States who are excellent painters of rosemaling styles from so many districts.

In 1996, her paintings were selected for the exhibition "Norwegian Folk Art: Migration of a Tradition" that traveled throughout the U.S. and Norway. She was one of three American painters to participate in the 2004 international symposium, "The Art of Rosemaling: Tradition Meets the Creative Mind." In 2005, Eldrid was honored by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) with its National Heritage Fellowship Award, the nation's highest honor in traditional arts. NEA bestows this award to only twelve artists nationwide each year, chosen for their artistic excellence, cultural authenticity, and contributions to their communities.

Biographical Note: Negrura Peruana performs the music and dance of Peru’s African and criollo population, originally living in the coastal area around Chincha south of the capital and later transplanted to the urban center of Lima. Enslaved Africans brought to Peru to work plantations eventually intermarried with Spanish settlers and native Indians, blending families, traditions, and music. African rhythms forbidden on drums could be played surreptitiously on packing boxes, giving rise to the signature instrument in the music of black Peru, the cajón. This music, a form of resistance to social and racial domination, always existed among those of African descent (currently numbering about two million, or one-twelfth the population), but did not become well known or popular in Peru until the 1990s.

The music played by Negrura Peruana uses a small number of percussion instruments, including the cajón, the quijada de burro - the jaw of a mule, the campana - a cowbell, the cajita – a little box played by flipping its lid, conga drums, and bongos. Recently the group has added a guitar player. Songs often take a call and response form, with texts featuring storytelling, satire, and social commentary. The song Toro Mata, one of the most popular in the repertoire (recorded also by Celia Cruz), compares a black man to a bull trapped in a bullfight.

Negrura Peruana features four dancers in addition to the seven musicians. Dances representative of Afro-Peruvian culture include the festejo, a dance of celebration and sometimes competition between men; the landó, with a slower tempo possibly derived from a matrimonial dance with Angolan roots; the zamacueca as a more Spanish-influenced version of landó; and the alcatraz, which tells a humorous story with two dancers trying to light a piece of cloth on their back ends – or avoid being lit. Growing up in Lima, members of the group heard and played these styles all their lives, with music as a central part of community celebrations, gatherings, and informal competitions. Although they are not professionally trained musicians, their performances show a deep love for the music and a spontaneous but highly skilled mastery of the complex rhythms, accents, and phrasings especially when accompanying the dancers.

Members of Negrura Peruana immigrated from Lima to the Hartford area of Connecticut in the late 1980s and early 1990s, seeking work. The first performance by Gustavo Chavez and Carlos Navarro took place in 2002 at Central Connecticut State University, when they were invited to demonstrate Afro-Peruvian music during the performance of a local Andean-Peruvian group. Since then the full group has appeared at a number of high-profile venues, such as the concert by Afro-Peruvian music icon Eva Ayllón (nominated for a Grammy in 2002), and also at local events such as Hartford’s Latino Expo, Samba Fest at the Riverfront, and the opening of the new Africana Center and the Peru Club for students at Central Connecticut State University. They have participated in workshops in New York City with African-Peruvian musicians including some from the internationally known group Perú Negro, under the auspices of the Center for Traditional Music and Dance. They gave performances at the Ritmos Di Mi Tierra Peru celebration at Our Lady of Fatima Church in Hartford, and for several years as part of the World of Sounds Outdoor Concert Series of the Hartford Public Library. The Connecticut Cultural Heritage Arts Program presented Negrura Peruana at the American Folklife Center and Kennedy Center Homegrown Concert Series in Washington, DC in 2005, and those concerts can be seen online. Based in the Greater Hartford area, Negrura Peruana has been a popular band for festivals, special activities, and house parties throughout the large Peruvian community in Connecticut. The group was selected for the performing artists roster of the Connecticut Office of the Arts, and they performed at CCHAP’s Outdoor Concert in July 2017.

Additional materials for these artists exist in the CCHAP archive.

Cataloging Note: This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services MA-245929-OMS-20.

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