Beyond the Archive

This site is a platform for collaborative, open access research on Música de los cultos africanos en Cuba (Music of the African Cults in Cuba), a collection of Afro-Cuban ritual music produced by Lydia Cabrera and Josefina Tarafa in Matanzas and Havana circa 1956. The collection consists of 14 LP discs containing over 11 hours of audio recordings, along with liner notes and photos. Given its scope and quality, the collection is arguably the single most robust multimedia archive of Afro-Cuban musical traditions in the mid-20th century.