Roberto Cepeda
Puerto Rican
As a Puerto Rican cultural leader, he is dedicated to the teaching and preservation of African-based music from Cuba and Puerto Rico. Roberto has toured all over the world sharing both bomba and plena musical traditions, and has been teaching the percussion and dance of bomba for decades. Many of his former students have gone on to begin their own careers in bomba. Currently Roberto leads the group Bomba Ashé and also sings, dances, and plays a variety of drums including the panderos of plena and the barriles of bomba. Based in the United States since 1965 and in Connecticut since 2016, Roberto offers master classes and workshops on drumming and dancing, presents educational programs in schools, and has performed as a soloist with leading Puerto Rican artists such as Los Pleneros de la 21 and Eddie Palmieri. Bomba Ashé includes Roberto’s wife Gloria Lopez, an accomplished bomba dancer and singer herself, and many of the most experienced bomba y plena musicians in the Northeast.
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